The first in what was to have been a series on American directors financed by the California Arts Commission and the newly-founded AFI, Directed by John Ford is Bogdanovich’s considered tribute to the great American director, about whom he had already written an invaluable book. Featuring candid conversations with Ford, John Wayne, Henry Fonda and James Stewart, the film is a rich evocation of Ford’s uniquely cinematic worldview and notoriously difficult personality, revealed in the clipped dialogue with the notoriously interview-averse – and occasionally taciturn – Ford, wonderfully shot in Monument Valley. With narration by Orson Welles, Directed by John Ford also includes revealing and skillfully edited excerpts from across Ford’s long career that reveal the breathtaking, iconic imagery that was his natural element.

Double Feature with The Searchers