The 28 Best Westerns of All Time (2024)

If you haven’t seen any westerns from the '50s, Shane holds up well. The film boasts beautiful landscape cinematography, thrilling story moments, and a quietly brilliant performance from Alan Ladd as the titular gunslinger.

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There was a great crop of new westerns that came along in the ‘90s after the classic Hollywood era. With a cast portraying infamous real western figures, including Kurt Russell as Wyatt Earp, Sam Elliott as Virgil Earp, and Val Kilmer giving a career-highlight performance as Doc Holliday. This cult classic has only become more legendary over time.

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The debut film from Robert Rodriguez is bursting with slick action—and it moves at an unrelenting pace, wringing every penny out of its shoestring budget. Due to a case of mistaken identity, a young aspiring mariachi is beset by a group of hitmen sent by a drug lord to kill a different local criminal.

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Surprise, surprise: Quentin Tarantino brought a very unique spin to the western in The Hateful Eight. The claustrophobic ensemble mystery begins with eight strangers getting trapped in a stagecoach stopover during a blizzard. The story is chock-full of twists—and every member of the ensemble gets a moment to shine.

Netflix

We could fill the whole list with Clint Eastwood movies if we really wanted to, but you shouldn’t sleep on his turn in Unforgiven, where Eastwood flexes his chops as both a leading man and the film’s director. With a classic setup of an aging gunslinger having to double back for one last job, Eastwood deconstructs the genre by approaching it with much more harshness than some idealized Golden Age films.

Amazon

If you want to lose yourself in a truly epic adventure, Dances with Wolves is a great watch. Director Kevin Costner also stars as a Union Army Lieutenant who is sent to man a military post far in the frontier, developing a relationship with a tribe of Lakota Sioux Native Americans.

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This criminally underrated film from Evil Dead director Sam Raimi has been positively reappraised for its frenetic cinematography, fun story of a deadly dueling tournament in the town of Redemption, and excellent performances from stars like Sharon Stone, Gene Hackman, Russell Crowe, and a young Leonardo DiCaprio.

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Another classic revisionist western that worked to subvert the expected conventions of the genre, McCabe & Mrs. Miller really feels like a slice of life in the boom town of Presbyterian Church, Washington. Over the course of the film, you grow to love the characters and care for the growing town. You see it transition from fall to winter, while threatening influences intrude to get a piece of the pie.

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Along with incredible eye candy with some of the slickest cinematography across the whole genre (thank you, Roger Deakins!), the powerful lead performances from Brad Pitt and Casey Affleck in The Assasination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford put fascinating faces on real figures from western history.

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Take one look at Jeff Bridges’s mustache in this movie and try to tell us this isn’t an all-time western. Hell or High Water was a shot in the arm for the genre, with a blistering modern heist story that follows two brothers trying to rob enough banks to save their family’s ranch—while Texas Rangers are hot on their heels.

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With an all-star cast of veritable legends including Yul Brynner, Steve McQueen, Charles Bronson, and Eli Wallach as the villain, this western was adapted from the phenomenal Akira Kurosawa film Seven Samurai to great success.

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Brokeback Mountain doesn’t come up nearly enough as a classic of the genre, especially for the aughts. Along with its absorbing and tragic romance tale, Brokeback Mountain is a lovingly captured film that shows us the inner drama of the characters and sweeping, epic landscapes with thought and care.

Apple

Yet another excellent western directed by Kevin Costner—way before his Yellowstone days, by the way—Open Range is a classic from the aughts. Robert Duvall and Costner deliver excellent lead performances as an open ranger and his hired hand, respectively, who clash with the ruthless leader of a town that hates open rangers.

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One of the first early-Hollywood productions to be shot outside of the United States, this story of broke drifers joining an old prospector to try and strike it rich panning gold in Mexico is gorgeous and sweeping. Legendary leading man Humphrey Bogart and the director John Huston’s father, Watler Huston, are highlights in this film.

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Appaloosa is a taut, stripped-back thriller directed by and starring Ed Harris. He stars as a lawman hired by the titular New Mexico town to help free it from the clutches of a ruthless rancher—who is played by the one and only Jeremy Irons, who killed the last sheriff.

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You didn’t need technicolor to capture the landscape of the American West. The black-and-white photography of this western has aged gracefully—and it’s fun to see star James Stewart in a more action-oriented role as a gunslinger with a score to settle.

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Believe it or not, this film has nothing to do with America’s beloved indie film festival. Selected for the United States National Film Registry, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid is a classic tale of two outlaws who head out on the lam after a botched train robbery.

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From Spaghetti Western visionary Sergio Leone, The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly is an Italian epic set in the Civil War era in which three men compete for a hidden fortune.

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Nothing says “Western” quite like John Ford directing and John Wayne as the leading man. Wayne stars as a Civil War veteran who embarks on a search for his abducted niece, alongside his nephew.

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A town marshal on the verge of retirement catches wind that a group of outlaws is planning to kill him the next day at noon. Faced with a moral dilemma, he must decide whether to take on the outlaws alone, or flee town and hang up his badge for good.

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