The Sons of Katie Elder

1965 film by Henry Hathaway
the song

The Sons of Katie Elder is a 1965 American Western film in Panavision, directed by Henry Hathaway and starring John Wayne and Dean Martin. It was filmed principally in Mexico.

The four adult sons of Katie Elder – John, who is a famous professional gunman; Tom, a professional gambler; Bud, the youngest brother, in his first year at mining college; and Matt, an unsuccessful hardware dealer – reunite in their hometown of Clearwater, Texas, (107 miles east of Dallas in northeast Texas), in 1898 for their mother's funeral, sharing regret that none of them has lived up to her high expectations of them. The townspeople and new deputy sheriff are unwelcoming, to John and Tom in particular. Katie Elder, however, was loved by everyone in the community, who were all aware of her honesty, her poverty, her generosity and her undying love for the sons who neglected her. The brothers want to do something for Katie's sake, and after an argument about marble monuments ends in a brawl, they decide to send Bud back to college. However, Bud wants to emulate his eldest brother. Morgan Hastings, a gunsmith and rising entrepreneur, claims ownership of the Elders' rich ranch and access to water for his Hastings Gun Manufactory, saying he won it from their father Bass Elder in a game of cards. Bass was shot in the back that same night; the killer is still unknown. The Elders suspect foul play and, anticipating trouble, Hastings has brought in a hired gun, Curley. However, at first Hastings hides his hostile attitude towards the brothers, claiming that he offered to compensate their mother for the loss, but she refused. A rancher named Striker agrees to let the brothers drive a herd of horses from his ranch in Pecos to sell to the miners in Colorado, on credit, a deal he started with their mother. When the wise, much loved sheriff, Billy Wilson, asks Hastings some pointed questions, Hastings shoots him, framing the Elders. A posse intercepts them on their way back from Pecos with the herd. Billy dies before he can name his assassin, and a mob assembles to lynch the Elders. The judge insists that the Elders be driven to Laredo for safety. During the transport, Hastings arranges an ambush using the deputized townsmen in the escort, except for Deputy Sheriff Ben Latta, who, despite his hostility towards the Elders, remains dedicated to his duty. Curley plants dynamite under the bridge, and in the explosion, Matt is fatally impaled by a splinter; John kills Curley, Bud is seriously injured, and Hastings kills Ben when he tries to aid the Elders. John and Tom succeed in beating back the surviving ambushers; they return to town to get medical help for Bud and barricade themselves in the smithy. John tells the judge, now acting sheriff, that they can prove they were miles away when Billy was killed. The judge allows the doctor to tend to Bud and sends to Laredo for a marshal. That night, Tom sneaks out to kidnap Hasting's weak willed son Dave, but Hastings wounds Tom in the back. Hastings follows and shoots his own son to keep him from telling John the truth. In John and the judge's presence, Dave confesses his father's crimes before he dies. Now vindicated, John takes up arms in righteous fury and pursues Hastings to his gunsmith shop. After a gun battle, John shoots a cask of gunpowder inside the shop, blowing up the building with Hastings inside.

William H. Wright picked up a copy of Life of the Marlows by Glenn Shirley in a Los Angeles bookstore in 1953. Thinking that it would make the basis of a good Western, he paid members of the Marlow family $1,000 (about $1000.0 in 1953 is equivalent to about <calculated amount> in recent years when adjusted for inflation several decades later) each for the rights to make it into a screenplay. But when the movie was made 12 years later, the film's plot had been drastically changed. Talbot Jennings was credited for the script.

Paramount purchased the story by William Wright and Talbot Jennings in 1955. The story concerned five brothers and revolved around a cattle drive from Texas to Colorado. Sam Briskin was assigned as producer. Frank Burt was to write the script, John Sturges was going to direct and Alan Ladd was to star, making a return to Paramount after several years' absence – he still owed Paramount one film. Noel Langley signed to write a version of the script, and filming was to start in April 1956. However, in July 1956 it was announced that Ladd had bought himself out of his Paramount commitment by paying $135,000, and he would no longer make the film. (Henry Hathaway put this figure at $250,000.) Film rights were picked up by Hal Wallis, who had a deal with Paramount. In 1959 it was announced that Dean Martin would star. Eventually in 1964 John Wayne was signed to star, with Henry Hathaway to direct.

Filming was due to begin in September 1964, but had to be delayed until January 1965, after Wayne was diagnosed with lung cancer. Following Wayne's surgery to remove a cancerous lung and two ribs, the star insisted on doing his own stunts, and nearly contracted pneumonia after being dragged into a river. Outdoor locations were filmed in Durango, in northern Mexico, and the opening credits scene as a locomotive travels a narrow stream canyon valley on the famed Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad (now a scenic tourist train) Colorado, United States. The train depot scene that follows that (where the brothers wait for no show John Wayne) was filmed at Perkinsville Arizona, and that same train depot was used as Gold City near the end of How the West was Won. That train depot still stands at the end of the ride for Verde Canyon Railroad, a tourist train originating in Clarkdale, Arizona, before the train reverses and heads back. Former Disney star Tommy Kirk was signed for the film, presumably in the role of Bud Elder, but his arrest for being at a party where marijuana was used led to his being fired from the production. The name "Kate Elder" was one of several names used by Mary Katherine Horony Cummings, better known as "Big Nose Kate", a western icon and sometime companion of dentist / gambler / gunfighter Doc Holliday. As Holliday's Kate Elder lived until 1940, she cannot be the Katie Elder mentioned in this film. John Wayne and Dean Martin had also starred in Howard Hawks's Rio Bravo six years earlier, one of Martin's earliest dramatic roles after splitting with his longtime comedic partner Jerry Lewis. Four years later, Henry Hathaway also directed John Wayne in his only Academy Award winning role of Indian Territory U. S.
Marshal Rooster Cogburn in the original screen version of True Grit (1969). In addition to Wayne, actors Strother Martin, Dennis Hopper, and Jeremy Slate were all cast in that film as well.

The score was composed by Elmer Bernstein, who would also score True Grit by the same director and starring John Wayne. Johnny Cash sang a song in 1965 also called "The Sons of Katie Elder", written by Elmer Bernstein and Ernie Sheldon but, despite the title and composer, did not feature in this movie.