Obsessed with a "perfect" film

I've been a little obsessed with "STAGECOACH" lately.
JOHN FORD'S 1939 is rightly beheld as one of the greatest of film classics.

During the past few days, I've watched the film, watched it with the insightful audio commentary of film historian JIM KITSES and I've watched documentaries devoted to the masterpiece.

In breaking numerous film conventions, both visually (with ceiling shots and other innovations) and in characterization (with leading characters who prove to be the opposite of the supposed traits of their life's station) "Stagecoach" continues to demonstrate how to revolutionize both a genre and an entire medium.

"John Ford was my teacher," Orson Welles said. "My own style has nothing to do with his, but 'Stagecoach' was my movie textbook. I ran it over 40 times. I wanted to learn how to make movies, and that’s such a classically perfect one."

French critic André Bazin said:

"John Ford struck the ideal balance among social myth, historical reconstruction, psychological truth and the traditional theme of the Western mise en scène. None of these elements dominated any other. 'Stagecoach' is like a wheel, so perfectly made that it remains in equilibrium on its axis in any position."

I think that helps explain my obsession with "Stagecoach." It's so perfectly realized, I enjoy it from every conceivable angle.