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The Fighting Kentuckian

The Fighting Kentuckian

Western · Romance · 1949

John Breen (John Wayne), a Kentucky militiaman falls in love with French exile Fleurette De Marchand (Vera Ralston). He discovers a plot to steal the land that Fleurette's exiles plan to settle on and aims to foil it.

Movie details

The Fighting Kentuckian

“ROUGHER, TOUGHER, MORE ROMANTIC THAN EVER!”

1949 Western · Romance 1h 40m

Critical arithmetic

The consensus, allegedly.

IMDb

6.4 / 10

3.8K votes

TMDB

5.9 / 10

Community rating

External scores via OMDb · CC BY-NC 4.0. Values normalized for display; availability varies by title.

John Breen (John Wayne), a Kentucky militiaman falls in love with French exile Fleurette De Marchand (Vera Ralston). He discovers a plot to steal the land that Fleurette's exiles plan to settle on and aims to foil it.

CriticWise case file

What this film says about your taste.

Not a recommendation score. A measure of how closely the film’s taste signals resemble yours.

The archetype split

Who fights over The Fighting Kentuckian?

The split comes from the same five-axis model used by the test, not audience ratings or review sentiment.

Taste neighbourhood

Nearby on the taste map.

TMDB supplies the candidates. CriticWise reorders them by craft, strangeness, prestige, emotion, and pace.

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Where it lives

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Names above the title

The people responsible.

Directed by

George Waggner

Written by

George Waggner

John Wayne

John Wayne

John Breen

Vera Ralston

Vera Ralston

Fleurette De Marchand

Philip Dorn

Philip Dorn

Col. Georges Geraud

Oliver Hardy

Oliver Hardy

Willie Paine

Marie Windsor

Marie Windsor

Ann Logan

John Howard

John Howard

Blake Randolph

Hugo Haas

Hugo Haas

Gen. Paul De Marchand

Court is in session

Put The Fighting Kentuckian on trial.

Two incompatible taste archetypes. One film. Read the arguments, then issue a completely binding cultural ruling.

The defence The Sentimental Softie

“Sincerity is not manipulation.”

The film risks embarrassment to make emotion communal, and that openness is harder than fashionable detachment.

The prosecution The Big-Idea Head

“The strings are showing.”

Every cue tells you exactly what to feel and when, leaving sentiment to do the work character should have done.