Like all narrative genres, Western has its own sets of tropes, scenes, and settings that build up most of its movies as if they were bricks. Said bricks can be rearranged, reworked, deconstructed, or played straight, but they all remain familiar to audiences and ultimately help build a love for the genre, which ensures that people will return to see any new Western movies being released.

Among these tropes, one of the most popular ones is the character of the cowboy. The Western genre world wouldn’t be the same without its cowboys, be they the more traditional ones shown herding cattle or sheep or the ones who prefer to swing a gun around and get into fights either with or against the law. Whatever the case, cowboys are the bones of the Western genre, which has had its fair variety of them over the years.

10

All The Pretty Horses (2000)

Directed By Bill Bob Thornton

All the Pretty Horses is as classic a cowboy story as they come, based on Cormac McCarthy’s novel of the same. The plot follows the main character John Cole—played by Jesse Plemons as a young boy and by Matt Damon as an adult—as he travels from Texas to Mexico in search of work. Cole’s life continues through a series of trials and tribulations, both in love and with the law.

The character of John Cole is a textbook example of the cowboy trope that has been so popular in Western narratives. Goodhearted and honest but rough on the surface, with a strong moral compᴀss that is however one of his own making rather than the one dictated by society. Cole does just that by seeking revenge on the corrupt police captain who killed his friend, Blevins, even though he ultimately decides not to be the one to put an end to his life.

9

The Hateful Eight (2015)

Directed By Quentin Tarantino

Quentin Tarantino is no stranger to Western influences, which have always been present as a thematic undercurrent in his movies before properly coming to the surface with Django Unchained in 2012 and The Hateful Eight in 2015. While Django Unchained is arguably the most popular movie of the two, The Hateful Eight is the one that really dives into the Western atmosphere and tropes.

One of the ways The Hateful Eight does that is by having a cast of eight characters that are essentially a collection of stereotypical Western figures, which have been worked and reworked time and time again ever since the genre started to become popular in the 1930s. Among those characters there is also, of course, the cowboy Joe Gage, played by Michael Madsen and known as “The Cow Puncher”. Like the rest of the movie’s characters, he finds himself snowed in at a lodge where the atmosphere soon becomes explosive with so many people taking shelter in there.

8

The Horse Whisperer (1998)

Directed By Robert Redford

Every good cowboy story needs its horse companions—and arguably, so does the entire Western genre. As the тιтle suggests, The Horse Whisperer focuses heavily on the relationship between humans and horses. The тιтular “horse whisperer” is the main character Tom Booker, played by the movie’s director Robert Redford, who is hired to help a teenage girl, Grace, and her horse recover and regain their trust in one another after a riding incident that left them both injured.

Tom is another quintessential cowboy character, showing both a deep understanding of horses and the softness needed to build a deep bond with his young charge, who, of course, initially mistrusts him. Like a good chunk of cinematic cowboys, he is also unlucky in love, since his budding relationship with Grace’s mother Annie never goes anywhere and he ultimately watches her leave together with her family.

7

Brokeback Mountain (2005)

Directed By Ang Lee

Based on the short story of the same name by author Annie Proulx, Brokeback Mountain is a movie whose importance can’t be understated. Quite the unique story in the Western genre at the time of its release—since masculinity had always been portrayed in a very specific way up until then—and a landmark movie when it comes to LGBTQ+ cinema, Brokeback Mountain’s praise and accolades are more than deserved.

At its heart, though, Brokeback Mountain remains a quintessential cowboy story. The two main characters, Heath Ledger’s Ennis Del Mar and Jake Gyllenhaal’s Jack Twist meet in the summer of 1963 when they’re both hired to herd sheep on the тιтular and fictional Brokeback mountain in Wyoming. Their time up the mountain leads them to develop an intense relationship that will follow them for the rest of their lives, bringing both great love and terrible despair.

6

The Searchers (1956)

Directed By John Ford

The Searchers is a classic of the Western genre and rightfully so, featuring a whole array of classic tropes—that were partially made classics precisely because they were used in movies like The Searchers—with pillars of the genre both in front of the camera and behind it. The story follows retired Civil War veteran Ethan Edwards, played by John Wayne, who spends years looking for his niece who was abducted by Comanche raiders.

John Wayne’s Ethan Edwards is another face of the cowboy character, one that shaped the genre for years to come. This cowboy is a reluctant warrior, someone who hoped to retire to a quiet life but who finds himself having to saddle his horse again and ride out to fight another day. Several other characteristics that have become ᴀssociated with the cowboy trope can be found here, from the strong moral compᴀss to the need for revenge.

5

The Power Of The Dog (2021)

Directed By Jane Campion

The Power of the Dog, directed by Jane Campion who won an Academy Award for it, brings more complexity to a classic Western atmosphere by transporting inside a psychological drama, something that proves once more that Western really does go well with everything. Everything happens on the Montana ranch belonging to brothers Phil and George Burbank, where George has brought his newlywed wife Rose and her teenage son Peter.

Phil, volatile and mean, seemingly dislikes the quiet and studious Peter, but the two circle each other closer and closer in a relationship that will prove itself ᴅᴇᴀᴅly and define the entire story of The Power of the Dog down to its тιтle. Despite being the only character who could be considered the villain of the movie, Phil, brilliantly played by Benedict Cumberbatch, is a fascinating modern take on the cowboy. He almost has genre awareness, knowing perfectly well the limits of his trope but chafing against them nonetheless.

4

Once Upon A Time In The West (1968)

Directed By Sergio Leone

Widely considered not just one of the best Westerns ever made but also one of the best movies of all time, Sergio Leone’s Once Upon a Time in the West is an epic tale of trials and tribulations that has not stopped capturing the hearts of audiences ever since its release towards the end of the Sixties. The plot, at its core, is quite simple—an outlaw and a gunslinger decide to join forces and help a widow save her ranch from the man who killed her husband, Frank, played by an iconic against-type Henry Fonda.

While the characters of Cheyenne and Harmonica, played by Jason Robards and Charles Bronson respectively, aren’t exactly cowboys in the most traditional definition of the term, the impact they left on the Western genre and its cowboys can’t be understated. The cowboy trope, after all, has several declinations beyond the one of a man whose primary job is herding cattle.

3

True Grit (2010)

Directed By Joel And Ethan Coen

The Coen brothers’ version of True Grit is the second adaptation of author Charles Portis’s novel of the same name after the one directed in 1969 by Henry Hathway. This remake sees Jeff Bridges in the role that was once John Wayne’s, that of aging U.S. Marshal Rooster Cogburn, who is hired by young but headstrong Mattie Ross to bring to justice the men who killed her father.

True Grit is an atypical take on the classic Western duo just like Rooster Cogburn is a peculiar version of the cowboy trope. Trigger-happy and too fond of his liquor, he’s a character that by all means should be aging out of the story and is instead dragged back into it by Mattie, who in turn shows all the budding characteristics that make for a true cowboy—or cowgirl, in this case.

2

The Magnificent Seven (1960)

Directed By John Sturges

While most Westerns feature one gunslinging cowboy, The Magnificent Seven has, like the тιтle suggests, seven of them. The movie is a Western-flavored remake of Akira Kurosawa’s 1954 landmark movie Seven Samurai, and while there are, of course, some differences due to the different settings, the overall plot remains more or less the same.

Said plot starts when a poor Mexican village decides to fight back against the raiders that regularly steal their provisions of food and supplies and send three of their own to buy guns so that they can protect themselves. In the end, the three villagers return with seven expert fighters who eventually eliminate the threat, one gunfight after the other. Each of the тιтular magnificent seven could very well be considered a cowboy of the gunslinger variety, even though they all come from different walks of life.

1

The Good, The Bad And The Ugly (1967)

Directed By Sergio Leone

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly is simply one of the most significant movies of the entire Western canon. Everything in it, from its music to its sH๏τs to its characters, is iconic in its own right and has helped shape the face of the genre. It’s also the final installment of director Sergio Leone’s Dollars trilogy, which includes A Fistful of Dollars and For a Few Dollars More which were released in the previous two years.

Among the three тιтular characters, Clint Eastwood’s Blondie, “the good,” is the one that most closely resembles the classic Western cowboy character. He’s a lonesome bounty hunter with a mysterious past and an equally mysterious future, who briefly partners up with Eli Wallach’s Tuco, “the ugly,” to search for a stash of Confederate gold while still thinking mainly about his own interests.