A solitary figure, a gun, a hostile landscape: the western can be cinema at its most primal. But when the genre is tackled by storytellers looking to challenge the myth – whether just to have some fun with it, or use it to tell the stories that used to be overlooked, or set the familiar stories in new settings and see how they evolve – that’s when you get something really special.
Whatever their shape or style, westerns are all about exploring new territory, so saddle up: your wild ride begins here.
The Drover’s Wife
Life was hard on the frontier for many reasons, and sometimes the spread of civilisation brings nothing but bad news. For Molly Johnson (Leah Purcell, who also writes and directs), living on the fringe of her Snowy Mountains community, minding the farm and children while her husband’s away is a tough but honest living. When she finds wanted man Yadaka (Rob Collins) on her property (at the worst possible time), he makes her life a little easier, but having him in the area brings with it a level of attention that she has good reason to dread. Purcell’s reworking of the Henry Lawson story of the same name is a hard-edged look at the burdens placed on those seen as “lesser” by society – working women, indigenous men – and how any triumphs they had were hard-won.
The Drover's Wife is streaming at SBS On Demand.
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The Drover's Wife
drama • 2021
drama • 2021
A Fistful of Dollars / For a Few Dollars More / The Good, The Bad and The Ugly
Loosely known as the Dollars trilogy, with these three films director Sergio Leone made westerns cool, made Spain look more American than America, and made a TV actor named Clint Eastwood into a star. Fun fact: did you know that the so-called “Man With No Name” played by Eastwood is actually given a (different) name in each film? Or that they’re technically made in reverse order, with the last film slowly revealing how Eastwood’s character put together his iconic look? What makes each of these films timeless classics is their mix of thrilling pulp storytelling (with the first film “borrowing” the plot of samurai classic Yojimbo), note-perfect casting and Leone’s iconic style. Close-ups of eyes squinting into the sun have never been more dramatic.
All three films are streaming at SBS On Demand.
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A Fistful of Dollars
western • 1964
western • 1964
Stream free On Demand
For a Few Dollars More
western • 1965
western • 1965
Stream free On Demand
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
western • 1966
western • 1966
Mad Dog Morgan
Dennis Hopper might not be the first name that comes to mind when you think of westerns, but with this (and also T, another film in the Wild Westerns collection) he proved to be adept at honouring the genre and – at times – turning it on its head. This tale of a violent Australian bushranger (Hopper) and his aboriginal partner (David Gulpilil) is part action movie, part historical drama, and (a big) part trippy countercultural experience. Hopper’s off-the-wall performance is stunning, unforgettable, and at times surprisingly subtle. It also features perhaps the most memorable closing line (delivered by Frank Thring) in all of Australian cinema.
Mad Dog Morgan is streaming at SBS On Demand.
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Mad Dog Morgan
biography • 1976
biography • 1976
First Cow
Survival out west wasn’t always about who was quickest on the draw. Cookie (John Magaro) is a cook in 1820’s Oregon; King Lu (Orion Lee) is a Chinese worker on the run. When circumstances bring them together, they realise they have a shared dream – to make a peaceful living off the land. When the local bigwig takes delivery of the first cow in the region, they see their chance to turn a nice profit stealing the milk to make biscuits. But out west milk is as precious as gold, and just as likely to get you into trouble. Straightforward yet deeply moving in its portrayal of friendship, it’s a story with small stakes but a very big heart.
First Cow is streaming at SBS On Demand.
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First Cow
drama • western • 2019
drama • western • 2019
New Gold Mountain
In the Chinese community around the Ballarat goldfields in the 1850s, Wei Shing (Yoson An) is a man who gets things done. It’s a tough job, and when a murdered white woman is found in the camp it gets a lot tougher. Against a volatile backdrop where various forces – both white and Chinese – are jockeying for power and influence, he now has a mystery to solve, and not everyone wants him to succeed. With a bustling supporting cast and lively locations (it was largely filmed at Ballarat’s historical Sovereign Hill), it’s both a gripping mystery and a nuanced portrait of the multicultural society that sprang up around the lust for gold.
New Gold Mountain is streaming at SBS On Demand.
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New Gold Mountain
series • drama
MA15+
series • drama
MA15+
The Settlers
The big lie underlying the idea of a frontier was always that the land was empty and waiting to be claimed, and this (far) south of the border drama confronts that head-on. When a Spanish landowner wants to assert his claim to a large swathe of Patagonia in the 1800s, he sends two westerners – a former British army officer and an American gunslinger – together with a native Chilean guide to clear the (visually stunning) territory. Exactly what that means only gradually becomes clear, as what was a nurturing home to the indigenous people is turned into a soul-destroying Hell by the increasingly murderous newcomers.
The Settlers is streaming at SBS On Demand.
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The Settlers
Crime drama • 2023
Crime drama • 2023
Django
In the best tradition of the always overcooked spaghetti western, there is a lot going on in this series. When Civil War veteran Django (Matthias Schoenaerts) turns up in the town of New Babylon looking for his daughter, he stumbles into a clash between the settlement of freed slaves and a gang of racist fundamentalists (led by Noomi Rapace with an amazing accent) that want the land it sits on. Everything is personal, nobody is who they seem, and by the time things start being solved by gunplay you won’t know who to cheer for – but you’ll definitely know who you want to see get what they deserve.
Django is streaming at SBS On Demand.
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Django
series • drama
MA15+
series • drama
MA15+
The Magnificent Seven
Tormented by regular raids from a gang of bandits, the residents of a small Mexican village decide to fight back and hire a motley bunch of washed up gunfighters and thrill seekers to fend off the bandits. If all this sounds familiar, that’s because it’s a western remake of The Seven Samurai; director John Sturges and an all-star cast (including Yul Brynner, Steve McQueen, Charles Bronson, Robert Vaughn and Eli Wallach as the bandit leader) turned it into one of the towering classics of the western genre, and a near-perfect example of Hollywood film-making at its finest.
The Magnificent Seven is streaming at SBS On Demand.
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The Magnificent Seven
