The Alamo with John Wayne: DVD Cover
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The Alamo Director: John Wayne Cast: John Wayne, Richard Widmark, Laurence Harvey, Frankie Avalon

DVD - Wide Screen / Dolby 5.1 / Stereo / Mono Learn more

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  • DVD Release Date: 12/05/2000
  • Original Release: 1960
  • Rating: Not Rated
  • Sales Rank: 6,620

Viewer Rating: (5 ratings)

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  • Overview
  • Editorial Reviews
  • Scenes
  • Customer Reviews
  • Cast & Crew
  • Full Product Details

Scenes

Features

"John Wayne's The Alamo" documentary; Collectible booklet; Original theatrical trailer

Full Product Details

Scene Index

Side #1 --
0. Scene Selections
1. Main Title [2:57]
2. No Army For Texas [5:09]
3. A God-Fearing Man [2:39]
4. A New Home [3:24]
5. Third-Hand Rumors [4:46]
6. Parson and the Boy [3:25]
7. Crockett Meets Travis [7:04]
8. "Republic!" [3:51]
9. Overdressed Riff-Raff [4:15]
10. "A Woman In Trouble" [6:38]
11. Bowie's Mexico [5:17]
12. The Church Arsenal [5:46]
13. Lying For a Cause [:22]
14. "Chastise!" [5:36]
15. The Tree Stump Speech [5:03]
16. Gallant Tennesseans [5:15]
17. The Short Way to War [4:21]
18. No Such Cannon [6:01]
19. 15 Men, All Sober [3:22]
20. No Insubordination [5:01]
21. The Morning After [6:20]
22. Message In a Hat [4:16]
23. Food Run [6:43]
24. Bring Home the Beef [4:21]
25. "No Woman Ever Lived..." [:50]
26. Attack! [4:11]
27. Blessed Be the Dead [8:52]
28. No Help, No Surrender [3:48]
29. News for General Sam [1:04]
30. The Longest Night [5:29]
31. Battle to the Death [3:05]
32. The Last Soldier's Wife [5:31]

Scene Index

Editorial Reviews

A sprawling, long-winded, and unabashedly patriotic spectacle, John Wayne's The Alamo provides the definitive motion-picture representation of the 13-day siege that enabled Texas to secure its independence from Mexico. This 1960 epic, a deeply personal project that obsessed Wayne for years and sapped his personal fortune, plays fast-and-loose with historical reality; nonetheless, it admirably conveys the indomitable spirit of the martyred "Texicans" whose heroic defense of an old mission in San Antonio bought precious time for the burgeoning rebel army that ultimately defeated Mexican general Santa Anna. Wayne, who produced and directed the picture (reportedly with some assistance from his old friend and mentor, John Ford), plays Davy Crockett to Richard Widmark's Jim Bowie and Laurence Harvey's William Travis. The battle scenes are lavishly mounted and impeccably staged, but there's more to The Alamo than gunsmoke and cannon fire: James Edward Grant's script is peppered with stirring odes to democracy, and Dimitri Tiomkin complements Wayne's images with one of his most evocative musical scores. MGM's latest DVD release presents the film in its traditional release version of 161 minutes; a longer cut -- the film's "roadshow" version -- appeared on laserdisc some years ago. Ed Hulse, Barnes & Noble

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Customer Reviews

Alamoby Anonymous

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May 23, 2007: The Alamo was the realization of a years long dream of John Wayne and it shows. From the meticulous recreation of the Alamo compound and San Antonio de Bexar (from original drawings & plans) to authentic period costumes to outstanding casting. The only drawback to production was writer James Edward Grant's script. Another was the later editing that took many of the best scenes. One of which was my favorite: the parson's death scene. I'm looking forward to seeing a DVD special edition of the director's cut along with the trailer and complete featurette.

Alamoby Anonymous

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July 24, 2004: John Wayne?s conviction was so firmly steeped in his production of 'The Alamo' that he went out on his own to direct this lumbering fictional account of the slaughter of 187 men at the Texas landmark after every major studio in Hollywood turned him down. The resulting film is a sprawling and unabashed flag waver that quite simply fails to get the patriotic juices flowing. Wayne plays Davy Crockett as something of a Disney-fied fun-loving frontiersman who?s not above a good brawl. Laurence Harvey needs less starch in his britches as the rigid Col. William Travis. Richard Widmark as Jim Bowie is left to veer between Wayne and Harvey in a performance that can only be described as unsympathetic. Richard Boone, Chill Wills and (oh, you gotta be kiddin' me) Frankie Avalon are in it too. Frankie doesn't sing. No expense was spared in this brick-by-brick recreation of the Alamo. The laserdisc version contained the original director's cut of 'The Alamo'. This DVD is the standard theater release version. There's no entrance, exit or intermission music and the aspect ratio is misframed at roughly 2:25:1. Colors are generally rich and vibrant but during scenes taking place at night they tend to become a muddy, grainy mess. The scene in which Crockett is confronted by Travis in the saloon is riddled with age related artifacts and a faded camera negative that looks as though it were dragged by four wild horse through the Texas deluge. The audio is 5.1 but strident in spots and remarkable muffled in others. Extras include ?The Making Of The Alamo? featurette - but it has been edited for DVD - presumably because, like the film, it just was not possible to digitally compress all that information on one side of a DVD. So why didn't MGM do a 2-disc or flipper disc for this film?!?! Go figure. Perhaps with the remake of 'The Alamo' getting ready to debut on DVD we'll see MGM go back to their vaults and revisit this Western saga.


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This item Rated Appropriate for Ages 15 and Up

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Why We Rated This Appropriate for Ages 15 and UP

What to watch out for

  • Violence:

    Intense battle violence. Everyone in the Alamo is killed.

  • Drugs:

    Drinking and smoking.

  • Language:

    Some strong language.

  • Sex:

    Sexual situation, not explicit but with an implication of coercion.

  • Consumerism:

    Not an issue.

  • Messages:

    Not an issue.

What Parents Need to Know

About TheAlamo

Parents need to know that this movie has intense battle violence with many deaths. Everyone in the Alamo is killed (made clear at the very beginning of the movie). Characters drink and smoke and use some strong language, including insults like "catamite" that might be unfamiliar to today's audiences. There is a sexual situation with a hint of coercion. A character refuses to free his slave, saying, "You're my property until I die."

Families Can Talk About

Families can talk about why it made such a difference when Travis picked up the cannonball. What did Travis mean when he said, "Texas has been a second chance for me. We will sell our lives dearly?" Why didn't Travis and Bowie get along? How did Crockett's understanding of what he represented to his fans affect his decision about how to respond? How did the white and non-white characters see their priorities differently? How does this story relate to current conflicts in Israel, Iraq, and Afghanistan?