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The Outlaw Josey Wales 171

Set during the aftermath of the American Civil War, The Outlaw Josey Wales follows a man whose whole family was killed, leading him to join a group of Confederate guerrillas to track down the killers. After eventually being sold out, however, he is on the run from bounty hunters and Yankee soldiers (including the group who killed his family). Along the way, while racking up a prodigious body count, Wales meets a group of people whom he reluctantly allows to join him. Hilarity Ensues. As does a lot of killing. This is a Clint Eastwood movie, after all.

Based on the novel Gone to Texas: The Rebel Outlaw Josey Wales, by Forrest Carter. The original printing of the book was less than one hundred copies, but one of those copies was sent to Eastwood...


The Outlaw Josey Wales provides examples of:[]

  • Action Film Quiet Drama Scene: Two fantastic examples in Wales' confrontations with Ten Bears and Fletcher. (From the latter: "We all died a little in that damned war.")
  • American Civil War: Specifically the carnage in Missouri, where the guerrilla fighting was so vicious by both sides that it was practically a civil war within the Civil War itself.
  • Anti-Hero: Wales himself.
  • Author Tract: The portrayal of the Union soldiers in the film make it quite apparent that this film and the book it was based on were written by a pro-segregationist Southern apologist.
  • Badass: Well, the lead is played by Clint Eastwood.
  • Badass Grandpa: Lone Watie.
  • Bounty Hunter:
Cquote1

 "A man's got to do something for a living these days."

"Dyin' ain't much of a living, boy."

Cquote2
  • Catch Phrase: "I reckon so."
  • Click Hello: This is done twice. First, when Clint Eastwood pulls a "click hello" on Chief Dan George; and later, when Dan George returns the favor, an Indian girl Eastwood freed pulls her own "click hello" on Chief Dan George (again):
Cquote1

 Lone Watie (Chief Dan George): I'm gettin' better at sneaking up on you like this. Only an Indian can do something like this.

Josey Wales (Eastwood): That's what I figured.

Lone Watie: You figured?

Wales: Only an Indian could do something like that.

[Lone Watie hears a gun cock behind him; turns and sees Moonlight]

Cquote2
Cquote1

 "You promised me those men would be decently treated."

"They were decently treated. They were decently fed, decently clothed, and then they were decently shot. Those men are common outlaws, nothing more." This from a US Senator allied to the Redlegs, themselves murderous (but pro-Union) guerrillas.

Cquote2
Cquote1

 "I had to come back."

"I know."

Cquote2
  • Real Life Relative: Josey's son was played by Clint Eastwoods son Kyle Eastwood.
  • Retired Badass: Josey attempts to become one of these.
  • Roaring Rampage of Revenge: why Josey signs up with Bloody Bill's troops at the start of the war when the Redlegs killed his wife and son. Subverted by Terill and a reluctant Fletcher who pursue the fleeing Josey Wales fearing the outlaw would continue his rampage after the war's end (when Wales seems more interested in just fleeing to Texas, and is more annoyed by the bounty hunters and soldiers he has to keep killing to survive).
  • Spiteful Spit: Clint Eastwood does this on anything that moves.
    • It doesn't always scare away the ones he's spitting on.
  • Shoot the Rope: This is how Clint Eastwood sends his pursuers downriver.
  • Wag the Director: In a weird way, the Trope Maker. Early in filming, Clint Eastwood decided that he could do a better job than the original director, Philip Kaufman, was doing. He therefore arranged for Kaufman to be fired and took over the directorial duties himself. The Director's Guild of America was so disgusted by this that they created a new rule stating that whenever a film's director is fired, their replacement has to be someone with absolutely no previous connections to the film whatsoever. This is why, nowadays, actors are forced to Wag the Director, rather than just outright firing them and directing the film themselves. More commonly they just hire someone willing to take orders.
  • War Is Hell
  • The Western: While it's mostly an anti-war movie, it's based in the Western theater of the Civil War and contains many of the tropes - Indians, gunmen, settlers, cavalry - found in standard Wild West films. It might rightly be called a "Pre-Western".