The Western was one of the few genres that did reasonably well during the box office slump of 1947 to 1968.  It was a pretty consistent genre throughout this time period because it showed the rugged West and was essentially an offering to the ideal of manliness and manhood.  John Ford was the greatest director of these movies during this time leading up to the ultraviolent Westerns that began to emerge in 1969, with John Wayne being one of the best Western actors, starring in many and having his best ones happen between 1949 and 1974.
The Western is defined by certain themes, such as progress versus nostalgia, civilization versus wilderness, violence versus idealism, and the male bond versus the male ideal of isolation.  These movies always have clear good and bad and the ability to achieve justice is always within reach.  These films were very important during the box office slump because of how the men returning from war could relate to them.  Post war men were having a hard time coping with the changes in society and so, they went to the western, which idealized what they were feeling.  The Western appealed to them because of the masculine way in which they solved conflicts throughout the film, and since men felt that postwar America was becoming feminized and they were being made to be less of men because of the nine to five work routine, the Western gave them an escape from that emasculation.
It was during this time that both John Ford and John Wayne rose to prominence within the Western genre: Ford as a director, and Wayne as an actor.  Ford’s brother got him a job at his studio and he worked his way up the ladder to start directing his own films.  He went on to direct some of the most important Westerns in this time period, such as Stagecoach, which was his first sound-era Western, and The Searchers.  Both of these films starred John Wayne, who became most popular during his 40s.  The pinnacle of his career was between 1949 and 1974, when he starred in movies such as Fort Apache, She Wore a Yellow Ribbon, The Searchers, and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance.  Wayne was the masculine man’s idol, and his roles played to the feelings of nostalgia for the Old West that the audience had.
The Western took a bit of a turn when it added ultraviolence into its necessities in 1969 with Peckinpah’s The Wild Bunch.  While these films still stayed true to the Western themes, the new violent style suggested that these new movies were speaking to a certain idea during a violent time in America’s history.  It was during this era that America was involved in Vietnam, and The Wild Bunch was critiqued as being a parallel between the violence onscreen and the violence that was going on in Vietnam.  This ultraviolence also branched off into other genres, including spaghetti Westerns that starred another Western star: Clint Eastwood.  Dirty Harry was one of these, propelling Eastwood on to stardom.  
