James W. Parker interested in Cynthia Ann but rather in her uncle James who had searched for her for eight years after her abduction." Historians and film critics have speculated on the inspiration for the character of Ethan Edwards in the John Ford movie The Searchers, with many saying that the character was based on James Parker. Critics and historians noted that James W. Parker, Cynthia Ann's uncle, spent much of his life and fortune in what became an obsessive search for his niece, like Ethan Edwards in the film. In addition, the "rescue" of Cynthia Ann, during a Texas Ranger attack on
The Ten Commandments (1956 film) New York City's Criterion Theatre on November 8, 1956. Among those who attended the premiere were Cecil B. DeMille and his daughter Cecilia DeMille Harper, Charlton Heston and his wife Lydia Clarke, Yul Brynner, Anne Baxter, Edward G. Robinson, Yvonne De Carlo and her husband Bob Morgan, Martha Scott and her husband and son, John Wayne and his wife Pilar Pallete, Tony Curtis, Janet Leigh, and Barney Balaban. It played on a roadshow basis with reserved seating until mid-1958, when it finally entered general release. It was re-released in 1966 and 1972, and one more time in 1989. The 1972