Patrick Wayne Movies

A few treasure-seekers try their luck on a tropical island and find a lost--well undocumented, anyway--civilization that has interesting marine capabilities and an unusual way of life. ~ Kristie Hassen, Rovi

In the conclusion of a three-part story, Jason McCord (Chuck Connors) manages to lure a gang of Mexican bandits into a trap at a US Army post, as part of his undercover mission on behalf of President Grant. Unfortunately, Jason is unable to convince the post's commanding officer Major Whitcomb (Wendell Corey), that he himself is not a bandit. Savoring the opportunity of executing "the coward of Bitter Creek", Whitcomb turns down McCord's demand to contact the President's office in Washington--and as time runs short, Jason must place his life is in the hands of the condemned Mexicans, the only ones in the fort who know the whole story. Unlike the rest of Branded's first-season episodes, "The Mission" was filmed in color (though whether or not it was originally broadcast in color is still a matter of dispute). ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

John Ford's last film to deal with World War II, Donovan's Reef is an alternately comical and sentimental look back on the fighting Navy men from that war, and how and where -- in Ford's eyes, and Frank Nugent and James Edward Grant's script -- they should have ended up. Michael "Guns" Donovan (John Wayne), Thomas "Boats" Gilhooley (Lee Marvin), and Dr. William Dedham (Jack Warden), a trio of navy veterans who fought on the Pacific island of Haleakalowa during the war, now live on the island. Donovan and Gilhooley, biding time and enjoying themselves, engage in rough-house hijinks among themselves, and are both part of the doctor's extended family, enjoying the good will of the islanders for whom they fought during the war. While Dedham is away on a call to a neighboring island, his grown daughter, Amelia (Elizabeth Allen), from his first marriage, whom he has never seen, announces that she is arriving from Boston to determine Dedham's fitness of character to inherit the majority shares in the family shipping business. Donovan contrives to present Dedham's three Polynesian children, whom the doctor had with the island's hereditary princess, as his own, and also squires Amelia around the island in her father's absence. In the process, the cold Bostonian woman discovers a whole world -- of passion, joy, heroism, and a life among men and women whose lives have been about something other than making money -- that she's never known. She also understands all of the good that her father has accomplished away from Boston, even though it entailed abandoning her. Sparks and even a few fists fly between Donovan and Amelia (and between Donovan and several other characters), in the usual Ford rough-house manner, before their eventual reconciliation and a romantic clinch at the end, in this sweet, sentimental comedy-drama. ~ Bruce Eder, Rovi

Pat Wayne, the real-life son of John Wayne, is cast as Ben Huttner, the illegitimate offspring of a wealthy Virginia colonel. The good news is that Huttner has fallen heir to the colonel's $5,000,000 estate. The bad news is that Huttner is on the lam from the law, charged with robbery and manslaughter. Catching up with Huttner, Paladin (Richard Boone) offers the man a choice: relinquish all claims to his inheritance, or return with Paladin to stand trial--and very likely face a quick execution. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

George Washington McLintock (John Wayne) has a saddlebag full of trouble. The owner of the largest ranch in the territory, which also includes a mine and a lumber mill that he built up himself, should be a happy, fulfilled man, but he isn't. His wife, Katherine (Maureen O'Hara), walked out on him two years ago without a word of explanation and has been living back east and running in very fancy circles. He's getting older, a fact of which he's constantly reminded as friends around him decline in health. He's being challenged by their sons, eager to make their mark on the territory, and by the homesteaders who are pouring in with the support of the government, hoping to farm on land that's just barely adequate for cattle to graze on; he's got government officials underfoot, including an inept Indian agent (Strother Martin) and a corrupt land agent (Gordon Jones); the thick-headed, longwinded territorial governor, the honorable Cuthbert H. Humphrey (Robert Lowery), and the government back east are trying to push the Indians -- whose chiefs are some of McLintock's oldest enemies and his best and most honored friends -- by shipping them off to a reservation, where they'll be cared for like old women; and to top it all off, Katherine is coming back to secure a divorce and take custody of their 17-year-old daughter, Rebecca (Stefanie Powers), who's been at school back east and no longer likes anything to do with the West, any more than her mother does. All of that -- plus the presence of a young hired hand (Patrick Wayne) who's interested romantically in McLintock's daughter -- is the setup for a sprawling comedy Western with serious overtones, part battle-of-the-sexes and part political tract.

McLintock! was made mostly to keep John Wayne's production company solvent in the wake of the losses incurred from the production of The Alamo. Wayne needed a film that could be made quickly and have mass appeal, and he got more than he bargained for in James Edward Grant's screenplay, which owed a little to both The Taming of the Shrew and The Quiet Man. Shot in the spring of 1963 and premiered in late November of that year, McLintock! proved to be one of the star's most popular and successful films of the '60s. It was a prized possession of the Wayne estate and was held unavailable for all of the '80s and beyond until they missed the copyright renewal in 1991 -- after that, it emerged in numerous substandard videocassette and DVD editions. There was an authorized VHS edition from MPI in the early '90s, and there were legitimate showings on WTBS, but until 2005 there was no decent quality DVD version. Late that year, Paramount Home Video, working under license from the Wayne estate, released a beautiful letterboxed DVD edition loaded up with extras. ~ Bruce Eder, Rovi

In the final episode of Murder, She Wrote's third season, Jessica (Angela Lansbury) shows up at a studio to record one of her "Mystery Books for the Blind." Halfway through her recording session, the electricity fails and the studio is plunged into a blackout. When the lights come up again, it is revealed that the studio's co-owner has been murdered. Naturally, the "wrong person" is accused of the crime, obliging Jessica to set things right by exposing the real culprit--and this being a recording studio, rest assured that the most important clue will be aural rather than visual. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

A cult of "caninus" or dog-worshippers is terrorizing a farm woman in order to get her to sell them her land, land that they need for a special ritual. The members of the cult keep their association secret and apparently have infiltrated all levels of local society, on up to Senator Bradford (John Carradine) who is the cult leader. Gory scenes are interspersed throughout the story as the cult murders anyone who starts catching on to the fact that they exist. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi

The year is 1863. Wealthy Virginia landowner Charlie Anderson (James Stewart), a man of peace despite his autocratic behavior, steadfastly refuses to take sides in the Civil War. Bit by bit, Anderson's isolationism--and his way of living--is torn apart.
Charlie's daughter, Jannie Anderson (Rosemary Forsyth) falls in love with Confederate soldier Sam (Doug McClure). His youngest son, Boy Anderson (Philip Alford) is captured by the Confederate army and taken prisoner. Meanwhile, another son, James (Patrick Wayne) and his wife, Ann (Katherine Ross), are murdered by looters. And his oldest son, Jacob Glenn Corbett, is accidentally killed. How all of these personal tragedies culminate in a successfully sentimental finale is the peculiar charm of Shenandoah, which proved to be a hit with audiences on both sides of the Mason-Dixon line. James Lee Barrett's screenplay was later adapted into a successful Broadway musical, starring Northern Exposure's John Cullum in the Stewart role. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

CBS' first made-for-TV movie, Sole Survivor is a fantasy yarn founded on fact. In 1960, the ruins of an American bomber were found in the Libyan desert...but the remains of the crew were never located. In Guerdon Trueblood's teleplay, the ghosts of a bomber crew hang around their derelict plane, awaiting the day that their bones will be recovered and given a decent burial. The sole survivor, navigator Russell Hamner (Richard Basehart), has in the intervening 25 years become a general. He joins an investigation team that has come across the wreckage, while the ghosts plot to expose Hamner as a coward who deserted his post and left his crew mates to die. Sole Survivor premiered January 9, 1970. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

John Wayne's directorial debut The Alamo is set in 1836: Wayne plays Col. Davy Crockett, who, together with Colonels Jim Bowie (Richard Widmark) and William Travis (Laurence Harvey) and 184 hardy Americans and Texicans, defends the Alamo mission against the troops of Mexican general Santa Ana. There's a lot of macho byplay before the actual attack, including the famous "letter" scene in which Wayne craftily rouses the patriotic ire of his subordinates. Also appearing are Richard Boone as Sam Houston, and Chill Wills (whose somewhat tasteless Oscar campaign has since become legendary in the annals of shameless self-promotion) as Beekeeper. Wayne's production crew was compelled to reconstruct the Alamo in Bracketville, Texas, about a hundred miles from the actual site. Dimitri Tiomkin's score, including The Green Leaves of Summer, received generous airplay on the Top-40 radio outlets of America. Rumors persist that Wayne's old pal John Ford directed most of The Alamo; cut to 161 minutes for its general release, the film was restored to its original, 192-minute length in 1992. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi