The Searchers The Searchers The Searchers is a 1956 American Technicolor VistaVision Western film directed by John Ford, based on the 1954 novel by Alan Le May, set during the Texas–Indian wars, and starring John Wayne as a middle-aged Civil War veteran who spends years looking for his abducted niece (Natalie Wood), accompanied by his adoptive nephew (Jeffrey Hunter). Critic Roger Ebert found Wayne's character, Ethan Edwards, "one of the most compelling characters Ford and Wayne ever created". The film was a commercial success. Since its release it has come to be considered a masterpiece and one of the greatest and most
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