Synopsis
When his cattlemen abandon him for the gold fields, rancher Wil Andersen is forced to take on a collection of young boys as his cowboys in order to get his herd to market in time to avoid financial disaster. The boys learn to do a man's job under Andersen's tutelage; however, neither Andersen nor the boys know that a gang of cattle thieves is stalking them.
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Cast
- John WayneWil Andersen
- Roscoe Lee BrowneJebediah Nightlinger
- Bruce DernLong Hair
- Colleen DewhurstKate
- Alfred Barker Jr.Cowboy Fats
- Nicolas BeauvyCowboy Dan
- Steve BenedictCowboy Steve
- Robert CarradineCowboy Slim Honeycutt
- Norman HowellCowboy Weedy
- Stephen R. HudisCowboy Charlie Schwartz
Recommendations
- 63
Chicago Sun-Times
It's the ending, really, that spoils The Cowboys. Otherwise, it's a good-to-fine Western, with a nice, sly performance by Roscoe Lee Browne as the trail cook, and the usual solid Wayne performance. - 60
TV Guide Magazine
Mark Rydell shows some fine touches in his third feature, but the result is an overlong and often-dull movie that had the rare distinction of being one of the few John Wayne westerns that gasped at the box office. - 60
Empire
After several successful films where he plays the tough-as-nails cowboy, Wayne wasn't about to break the pattern now. Playing the only character he knows, he gives several inspiring speeches to an unlikely group of kids who turn from boys to men. - 60
Time Out
Although the film is well performed and beautifully shot by Robert Surtees, its ideology is highly objectionable, celebrating as it does the turning of the boys into hardened killers. - 60
Variety
The story [from a novel by William Dale Jennings] is long and episodic, and its gentle treatment makes the length something of a hindrance to maximum enjoyment. - 50
The New York Times
So flecked with minor dishonesties that you come to recognize it as a sort of Formica Western, something that amounts to a parody of the real thing. - 40
The New Yorker
Pious muck.
