Portrayals of Cowboys in Western Films

In this post I'm going to compare two western films - Tombstone(1993) and Jeremiah Johnson(1972) to see the different portrayals of cowboys depending on the source. In Tombstone we see Wyatt Earp joined by Doc Holliday and his brothers Virgil and Morgan become the marshals of Tombstone, Arizona a booming mining town. They were unable to tolerate the lawlessness of the town that was brought on by the Cochise County Cowboys. In this movie the cowboys are portrayed as tough, ruthless white males which is typical of cowboys but we usually see cowboys as the ones bringing order to frontier settlements however in this movie that is not the case. Their acts of violence were what was causing the disorder in tombstone. They are portrayed as purely evil while the marshals are the ones trying to bring peace and order to the mining town. However it does follow the typical western narrative that features a town on the frontier with some sort of thereat and a hostile surrounding feating a conflict between cowboys and policemen. Overall I would say the style of the movie fits the typical western movie, a lawless town on the frontier with a conflict over someone trying to bring order to it. However the portrayal of cowboys as purely evil, committing random acts of violence and causing the disorder seems a little uncharacteristic. Jeremiah Johnson's portrayal of the cowboy was a bit different from the cowboys we see in Tombstone. He is a white man man moving through the frontier by himself, attempting to be self sufficient and make it on his own and stake a new territory which is a pretty typical portrayal of the cowboy in western films. For the first part of he movie we see him struggling to make it then meting a fellow trapper and hunter who shows him the ways of living in the wilderness. Then on the way back from a hunt he meets Blackfoot  Indians who are threatening towards him, until he offers them the Elk he killed earring him their respect. He lived off the land until he found a fellow trapper buried up to his head by the Blackfoot Indians. The trappers asks him to help get his horse and supplies back from the savage Indians. Jeremiah did not want to fight them and wanted to wait until the Indians were asleep to steal their supplies back, so they did. However one of the Indians awoke and the trapper ended up killing the Indians. Jeremiah is then welcomed by another Indian tribe he offers the chief horses and the scalps of the Blackfeet in return the chief gives Jeremiah his daughter. He marries the girl and after this we see him living peacefully in a cabin in the woods with her and her son. This is different from what the typical portrayal of a cowboy is, to me cowboys usually ride alone or in a group but rarely do you see cowboys who are married going about their business not causing trouble. Soon the Blackfeet find his cabin and kill his wife and child as revenge. After this Jeremiah wanted about the woods for years killing any Blackfeet he saw. In this way we see him portrayed very differently throughout the movie. He does not want conflict with the Indians to start and even though he did not originally kill the Blackfeet they think it was him and get their revenge. This turns the peaceful self sufficient cowboy in to a different type of cowboy, a ruthless killer who wanted nothing but revenge on the Indians who killed his wife and son. To me there is some similarities in the way cowboys were portrayed in there movies but overall I think there was more differences. Obviously this is only two of the many western movies that were made but I found it interesting how they can portrayed differently throughout different movies.