This may be painful, but prior to Taylor Sheridan’s arrival as a storyteller, the Western genre’s heartbeat was growing faint; its glory days were a mere echo in Hollywood’s canyon. Who would have dared to dream that a movie could really spur a renaissance and bring the Western back to the forefront of American culture, reminding us all of the thrill of the untamed land?
Indeed, it was the Oscar-winning film Unforgiven, directed by and starring the legendary Clint Eastwood. This golden nugget of Western filmography not only capped off Eastwood’s illustrious career as a cowboy but also carved a path for new stories to gallop into modern audiences’ hearts. That being said, it even provided the creative tinder for Taylor Sheridan’s now-acclaimed Yellowstone.
How a Classic Clint Eastwood Film Influenced Taylor Sheridan’s Yellowstone
Taylor Sheridan, the mastermind behind the hit series Yellowstone, is a modern-day cowboy of storytelling, riding high on the neo-western wave he’s created with his previous works such as Hell or High Water and Wind River. Like a lone gunslinger in a dusty town, he fearlessly explores the dark and complex moral landscapes of the contemporary Western genre, leaving viewers spellbound with his daring narratives.
Drawing inspiration from classics like Clint Eastwood’s Unforgiven, Sheridan has composed a world where the lines between hero and villain are blurred, mirroring the harsh realities of modern life. According to Sheridan (via The Atlantic):
He [Eastwood] shattered the myth of the American Western. So when I stepped into that world, I wanted there to be real consequences. I wanted to never, ever shy away from, ‘This was the price’.
In Yellowstone, the Dutton family reigns supreme over their Montana ranch, wielding power and influence akin to a Mafia don. But behind the picturesque backdrop lies a web of treachery, deceit, and moral decay that threatens to destroy everything they hold dear.
The Duttons, much like Eastwood’s William Munny, are flawed anti-heroes who grapple with the consequences of their actions. From coerced suicides to cold-blooded murder, the family’s ruthless pursuit of power comes at a steep price. Each decision, each betrayal, haunts them with the ghosts of their past.
Exploring Taylor Sheridan’s Creative Mind: The People Who Inspired Yellowstone
It was not an overnight sensation for Taylor Sheridan to become passionate about modernizing the Western genre. Instead, he drew inspiration for his television and film work from the films and books he saw and read in his early adulthood.
During an interview with Variety in 2022, Sheridan discussed Yellowstone and the people who inspired him, citing a number of well-known writers and filmmakers. One thing that united all of his influences was that they all made a unique impression on the Western genre:
I was very influenced by writers like Cormac McCarthy, Larry McMurtry, Toni Morrison, who wrote about the time around the Civil War, which is obviously very similar themes. There’s a lot of Westerns about it.
And in terms of the movies that influenced me, it was watching ‘Unforgiven’ when I was in my late teens or very early 20s. The same with ‘Dances With Wolves,’ where you’re looking at the Western genre through a whole new lens that had never been explored before.
Clint Eastwood’s Unforgiven, thus, remains one of his greatest films, both as a director and an actor. The film took home four Oscars, including Best Picture and Best Director for Eastwood. Needless to say, Yellowstone does share the themes and aesthetic of Unforgiven.
The same can be said of Cormac McCarthy’s writings, as his novels Blood Meridian and The Crossing share the same subdued and gloomy narrative strategies as Sheridan’s Wind River. So it’s safe to say that, although the latter’s bodies of work are entirely original, many of his scripts are partially based on ideas from Eastwood and McCarthy.
Yellowstone Season 5’s second part will air on November 10, 2024.
You can stream Yellowstone on Paramount+, while Unforgiven is available to rent on Apple TV.
