- [Narrator] Maybe more than any other place, Utah's iconic landscapes have framed our idea of the American West.

- It became the public imaginary of the American West and Hollywood Westerns.

- [Narrator] Over a hundred years ago, Hollywood was lured here to explore Utah's cinematic potential, but what those early film pioneers found defied even their own expectations, unlocking a new storytelling frontier that even now, shows no sign of stopping.

(upbeat music) - [Announcer] Hollywood in Utah is made possible in part by the George S. and Dolores Dore Eccles Foundation, the Cleone Peterson Eccles Endowment Fund, and by the contributions to PBS Utah from viewers like you.

Thank you.

(upbeat music) - [James V. D'Arc] The American Western is a unique genre of filmmaking to Americans because it's emblematic of an American experience; Manifest Destiny, the endless horizon, the endlessness of possibilities for people.

- [Andrew Patrick Nelson] I tend to think of the Western as an adventure narrative set between the end of the Civil War and the turn of the century, east of the Rockies, west of the Mississippi.

Because it's a limited period of time in a fairly limited space.

And yet that space, that landscape has been probably the most fertile when it comes to sparking the, not only the American imagination, but imaginations around the world about what America is.

And then into the landscape come conventional characters, the pioneers, the lawman, the outlaw, the Indian.

- [Joanna Hearne] The Western is a settler colonial art form.

It is about the representation of settlement.

It is the representation of the theft of a continent, and it is a genre that consistently has represented indigenous peoples over time as invaders in their own land.

As settlers come in, the settlers are so often the heroes of the western.

(upbeat music) - [Narrator] The western became the staple for films made in Utah, but the land's potential for filmmaking first became apparent when Tom Mix, the most famous cowboy of his generation, arrived in Cedar City to film, "The Deadwood Coach."

- [James V. D'Arc] Utah managed to attract the biggest Western star of the 1920s, Tom Mix and his wonder horse, Tony.

They filmed in Bryce Canyon, they filmed right in the grotto area of Zion National Park and other directors saw what was in Utah and began to follow.

- [Andrew Patrick Nelson] It becomes immediately apparent just how versatile the landscape is.

They could place the camera in a single place and simply by rotating it a matter of degrees, you could go from the river, to the prairie, to the foothills, to the sagebrush, to the mountains, telling the entire story of America's westward pioneers in a single place.

- [Narrator] Neither Mix nor the Hollywood filmmakers who followed, would've made their way to southern Utah without the enterprising and ambitious Parry Brothers.

In the early 20th century, brothers Gronway, Chauncey and Whit moved to Cedar City to seek their fortune.

Their idea, capitalize on Utah's beauty by drawing tourists to the new Zion National Park, and entice Hollywood filmmakers to roll their cameras there.

- [James D'Arc] The Parry Brothers were the first iteration of an unofficial film commission.

Utah taught the rest of the country how to do this because of what the Parry Brothers did.

Chauncey, who had trained as a pilot in World War I took an airplane and his camera and took pictures of the region and would go down to Hollywood to show the studios what beauties they had up there.

- [Carol Ann Parry Nyman] Directors used big paintings as backdrops and he thought they should be coming up to Cedar City, up to southern Utah to do these because it's the real thing, the rocks are real and the canyons are real.

- [Ryan Paul] And these three brothers just all use their skills and their strengths to enhance not only their business, but to provide an opportunity for the people living around them and to really welcome Hollywood into their home.

Hollywood came back year after year, not just because the people of Cedar City were welcoming to them, but this landscape inspired the storytelling.

This landscape, in essence, became a character in the film itself, and that's not something you could get on a Hollywood backlot.

The residents of Cedar City are invited to become extras on these shows.

In fact, not only that, they host banquets for the crews.

It was really a labor of love.

- [Carol Ann Parry Nyman] When they were filming, "Can't Help Singing" and I was quite young and I remember the wagon train from in Parowan Gap, we were walking along in the dust, in the dirt, in the heat, and we were just pioneer people.

But it was also fun, a lot of fun.

- [Mary Gae McCullough] This is a picture of some of the extras and myself and my mother, who was also in the movie.

And I can still remember they furnished our lunch and they had an orange drink that was to die for.

- [Ryan Paul] And I think that for so long, people in rural Utah had been told they were separate from what was going on in Salt Lake, they were separate from the rest of the world.

And, now they could say, wait a minute, we're part of this, we're part of the Mythos of America.

This is us, this is our story.

They saw themselves in those films, as, I may not be the cowboy, but I can do what's right, I can stand up for what Tom Mix stands up for.

I think that by inviting people here and doing those types of films, the people in this community saw themselves as really being part of not only this new idea of movie making, but showcasing their values and their place to the rest of the world.

- [Narrator] Utah's rural small town values were deeply rooted in the state's faith.

Leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints preached against drinking, smoking, and gambling.

Daily life was focused on farming and family.

In 1929, the Parry brothers' decision to convert a small farmhouse into a lodge for Hollywood movie stars was a plot twist the tiny town of Kanab didn't see coming.

Suddenly, a stream of Hollywood productions rolled in and Whit Parry was right at the center of the action.

- [Ryan Paul] Whit is the front man of the Parry organization in Kanab, he finds his groove in the Parry Lodge.

He's the guy that brings the parties, when you come back from filming, lighting your cigar and feeding you and making you feel welcome in this small town.

- [Karen Alvey] He was so gregarious, so friendly and so kind and so charming.

He planned big parties with them, he drank with them and women absolutely adored him.

He just made everybody feel so good about themselves.

I was in my early twenties and I started working as a waitress first at Parry Lodge.

The longer I worked there, the more I loved it.

Some of the movie crews could be very, very demanding and he said to me one night, "If they want you to scrape the paint off the walls, you go ahead and start scraping, but make sure you charge them for it."

- [Dennis Judd] Whit Parry, in the back of Parry's Lodge, he built a place called, "The Black Cat" and they had slot machines in there and poker tables and the whole bit.

And so when they didn't have anywhere to go, they'd go into the Black Cat and gamble and play those slot machines.

- [Narrator] But when Hollywood's marquee names missed the rush of big city nightlife, Whit Parry found a small town solution.

When Frank Sinatra came to town to shoot "Sergeants 3" in 1961 with his Rat Pack buddies, Whit Parry rented out his own home to accommodate the star.

- [Karen Alvey] He rented the house because the townspeople didn't want the Rat Pack tainting the girls in town.

They had wild parties, they would bring the helicopters in and all the food and the girls and every night and sometimes they would, they would do things that kind of shock you a little bit, quite a bit.

- [James V. D'Arc] There was perhaps over fraternization with some of the locals, the male stars and the young star stricken females in town that caused situations that alarmed mothers, shall I say.

- [Narrator] So many films were made in Kanab that it was nicknamed, "Little Hollywood," but not everyone demanded red carpet treatment.

- [John Jacobs] Actually, when the stars came here to Kanab, back in the forties, fifties, sixties, even into the seventies, the stars, they became like family.

In fact, while James Garner was here filming, "Maverick," he was known quite often to go down to the Buckskin Tavern.

And when the bar keep would get a little too busy, he would just hop the bar and he would serve drinks to people and help out.

- [Dennis Judd] This, just got to be friends, just like in, that's the way all Kanab was.

So I just got to know him, Joel McCrea and I used to go rabbit hunting together and Sammy Davis Jr. and I would play football in the parking lot.

- [Dean Martin] Howdy.

We're shooting a little western epic here called, "Rough Night in Jericho."

- [Dennis Judd] Dean Martin come out making a movie, "Rough Night in Jericho."

I was six one and tall, dark and handsome and I had long black sideburns.

And this fellow cowboy says, "You'd be a good double for Dean Martin," because they were looking for somebody to ride this bucking horse for Dean Martin.

And they had this barrel and they had five four ropes going to it, and they put Dean on the barrel and they made the barrel buck up and down and they shot Dean from his waist up and then they put me on the horse, far away shots.

It looked really good, like he was riding a bucking horse.

So I did quite a bit of work with Dean on that show and we got to be pretty good friends actually.

- [Hal Hamblin] Anytime the movies came to town and, and I'm talking fairly big production movies, the town would just embrace it.

- [Carol Ann Parry Nyman] I think it had a big impact, a big economic impact.

It was a real boon.

So many people were employed for the summer or for two weeks or for a month, and it really helped the economy.

- [Hal Hamblin] And a lot of the local peoples benefited by either being chauffeurs or drivers or renting their horses, cars, wagons, trucks, whatever to the movies.

- [Narrator] Hamblin was about 16 when he got his chance, thanks to a ranting producer who was running outta time to nail a shot.

The sun was in the perfect place, the trick horses were ready, but there were no stunt men on set to ride.

Hamblin was among the local boys who saddled up.

- [Hal Hamblin] We went down and we practiced with them for about 20, 30 minutes.

And one horse just had a piano wire that we would pull on his flank and he would start to buck and we were to fall off.

They paid us $50 a fall and we shot that thing three times.

I made $185 that day.

And I remember taking that check down to my dad who was working at a filling station and showing him and he was just flabbergasted because he was making like $250 a month, it was big, big money for all of us.

(upbeat music) - [Narrator] For all of Utah's extraordinary expanses, none are more dramatic and vast than Monument Valley.

Straddling the Utah-Arizona border, the Valley reaches across 92,000 acres of the Navajo reservation.

Its sandstone buttes extend over a thousand feet to kiss the sky.

It's a set no Hollywood backlot could ever match.

It's not clear how Hollywood director, John Ford found his way to Monument Valley.

Some say John Wayne led the director to the desert, others say local trading post owner Harry Goulding went to Los Angeles with pictures in hand.

Either way, the Oscar winner was captivated.

Beginning with "Stagecoach," in 1938, Ford forged a relationship with Monument Valley that would last 30 years and cement an idealized version of the American West.

- [James V. D'Arc] It was one of the most remote places in the United States.

The logistics of getting to Monument Valley in 1938 were daunting because of all of their props and equipment that United Artists had to bring out there.

The normal course was you took a train from Los Angeles to Flagstaff, then switched all of your equipment and passengers into trucks and vehicles and drove for hours.

Not far removed from covered wagon travel to get up there, hoping while you were there spending lots of money every day that weather would cooperate.

- [Narrator] Harry and his wife Leone had been running the Goulding Trading Post since the 1920s.

He connected Ford with Navajos who were hired as crew, extras and roles not often listed in movie credits.

- [James V. D'Arc] John Ford had a medicine man from the Navajo tribe on the payroll, $15 a day, which was more than extras got.

So why did he pay him this much?

Well, while working on "Stagecoach," he needed a certain type of weather and implored the medicine man to deliver, and he did.

- [Orville Sisco] There's still some today that still do that due to the fact they've heard of what John Ford has done over the years.

Pretty much every big good sized production, we do that.

For good weather, good health, good things to come.

- [James V. D'Arc] It appeared on the screen for only 90 seconds.

The rest of "Stagecoach" was filmed in Southern California.

But those few seconds, those 90 seconds burns those images into one's consciousness and they say, this is the West.

- [Andrew Patrick Nelson] And it was a combination of not only seeing an impressive landscape, but integrating it into a story.

What we see is a wide shot and we see a very tiny stage coach traversing along the desert floor.

But then Ford does something really amazing.

We go from looking down at the stagecoach almost in whip pan up to Geronimo and his band of so-called Hostile Indians, there's a dramatic musical note.

And in doing so, there's this subtle equation between the landscape and its indigenous inhabitants.

In doing this, there's a kind of a revolution in how the American West is portrayed, right?

If there's opportunity, there's also danger and that tension and central to not only "Stagecoach," but the best Westerns from that point on.

- [Joanna Hearne] What's important, especially to understand I think about "Stagecoach," is that it crystallized a particular version of the aggressive Indian warrior invading on their own land.

The representation of Indians in the Western on screen as pure threat, and they have no other role.

This is an example of the Western really glorifying settler colonial violence and justifying it as self-defense.

(dramatic music) - [Narrator] Ford would go on to shoot eight of his most famous films in Monument Valley.

Five he made with John Wayne, elevating the B-list actor to a bonafide movie star.

The most celebrated of Ford's Monument Valley Films is, "The Searchers," which some film critics consider one of the greatest Westerns of all time.

- [James V. D'Arc] Steven Spielberg loved, "The Searchers," and it was an article of faith with him to watch that movie at least once every year, to be tutored on how to make a movie, how to craft a story.

- [Andrew Patrick Nelson] "The Searchers" seems to be where Ford really realizes the rich thematic potential of the landscape and how you could meld it with a particular type of narrative.

It's about characters searching for something and yet they end up going through the same landscapes over and over again.

And so Ford's reuse of particular images in Monument Valley and its characteristic landscape, actually serves a thematic purpose, giving a sense of powerlessness that there is this larger force, this nature that you simply can't overcome.

- [Dustin Tahmahkera] So "The Searchers" is inspired by a certain part of our Comanche family history.

My great-great-great grandmother, Cynthia Ann Parker, she was taken captive at age nine.

She was then rescued by the Texas Rangers about age 25 or 26, at which time she already has a Comanche husband, she has at least three Comanche children.

And the story becomes so heavily distorted in "The Searchers" adaptation of this Indian captivity narrative that at the end of the film, everyone goes back to the homestead, things are back to order for the white settlers.

What is not represented in the story is the truth of our accounts, that she never wanted to leave her Comanche people.

We don't see her missing her family, we just get this story that is being told through John Ford's lens and through John Wayne's character.

And nor would I expect them or maybe even totally want them to be in charge of a Comanche-centered narrative.

- [Robert Chapoose, Sr.] John Ford has a stereotype of what Indian people were like.

Like when I was an Indian, we had to act like Indians.

How, all of that.

We didn't speak English, we all spoke with a accent.

- [Dustin Tahmahkera] So often, the Western gets framed as just this colonialist narrative that did such damage and destruction, which it has done, and which we continue to feel the repercussions of.

But so often what is left out of the story are the indigenous actors, not just onscreen, but the indigenous actors offscreen, some of whom are finding employment in film and entertainment.

- [Robert Chapoose, Sr.] Some of the tribal members around here, they call me Indian John Wayne.

When "The Searchers" came out, I done all of John Wayne's riding.

I fell off of horses, I got shot, I don't know how many times being a calvaryman and being a soldier, being an Indian.

And they put wigs on us because we had a short hair, and they figured the Indian was bronze color.

So that's what they used to do, they used to paint us all down, they painted our armpits, they painted just completely all over.

- [Joanna Hearne] Monument Valley was John Ford's, imagined space.

It was the sort of playground within which he created an imagined west.

And you do have Navajo or Diné extras, playing Comanche characters or extras.

And you have a story that is set in Texas, being filmed in Monument Valley and you have layers of substitution.

The result of all of that is this completely artificial world called the West.

(dramatic music) - [Narrator] By 1948, Ford was seeking a new scenic stage for his storytelling.

He looked north to Moab, Utah, where rancher, George White introduced him to the region's deep canyons, arches, and cliffs.

- [James V. D'Arc] Well, Moab became a location for Westerns because they had seen and perhaps envied what had been going on in Kanab.

They wanted some of the business, plus the locals there knew the films that were being made down in Monument Valley.

And George White, the local state surveyor of roads, had a beautiful ranch on what is now Scenic Highway 128, right along the Colorado River.

The wonderful thing about the first film that Ford kept his promise to make in the area was a film that was partial to Utahans, it was called, "Wagon Master."

- [Actor] Well folks, we're gonna have to leave this hospitable community.

- [James V. D'Arc] And it's a thinly veiled account of Latter-day Saints in the pioneer days and their torturous journey from the north, cutting through solid rock crossing the Colorado River and founding the area around Moab, and it is a wonderful tale.

- [Narrator] The White family's history is chock full of stories of adventure and movie making.

White's granddaughter, Cricket Green, says Ford fell in love with the Family ranch, which hugs the Colorado River and became the site of the film, "Rio Grande."

(dramatic trumpet music) - [Announcer] Here is, "Adventure," starring John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara.

- [Cricket Green] The movie company paid my grandfather not to plant hay that summer.

So when you watch the movie, and you see the Roman riding scene where all of the tents are all set up for the cavalry, that's actually in their hay field.

And so they built the fort out in front of the ranch and when you see John Wayne walking and he's actually walking down our lane that we grew up on.

And then that fort stayed there until I believe '71.

But it was there, we played on it all the time as kids around it and on it and spent a lot of time.

- [Narrator] White's vision was bigger than a one shot movie deal.

To keep filmmakers coming back, he formed the Moab Film Committee in 1949.

It's said to be the longest running film commission in the world.

Then and now, a film commission's purpose is to connect Hollywood with the locations, talent, or odds and ends needed to get its movies made.

- [Bega Metzner] Whatever the request is, I need a wolf, I need a lizard, a unicycle.

And that's what we do as film commissioners, we are tasked to figure out how to help these movies get it done no matter what it takes.

Right here at White's Ranch is where it all started and people come to visit this area just to see it 'cause they saw it in a movie and the ranches, I mean, it's how they survived back then too, so not only did the Moab Film Committee at the time help facilitate making of films, but it actually helped pay for some of the ranches that existed back then because it brought in money during a very desperate time back in the forties and fifties, it was an incredible impact for a community that was trying to figure out having been a mining town into a busted mining town.

But film history sort of bridged the gap between the hard times and what the Moab area has become.

- [Narrator] Utah's role in the movies may sound picture perfect, but not every film was a hit.

The conservative values of the state's dominant religion sometimes clashed with Hollywood trends.

- [Andrew Patrick Nelson] So when Hollywood makes a big budget epic about Brigham Young.

- [Announcer] They arrive for the world premiere of, "Brigham Young" at Salt Lake City.

This is one of the most extraordinary events in the history of motion pictures.

- [Andrew Patrick Nelson] They're able to premiere it with ease.

Salt Lake City and the governor is able to declare it Brigham Young Day to make sure that no student would be deprived of the opportunity to go and see this film.

But then there are other moments where what the state sees as being a Utah film and what Hollywood sees are very different.

There's probably no better example of that than the centennial film, a Western called, "Ramrod."

- Well, "Ramrod" is a fascinating example of history meeting art.

1947 was the centennial of the Mormon pioneers arriving in a desolate, isolated.

- [Narrator] The "Ramrod" Premiere was a major event.

More than 50 movie stars and studio executives came to Salt Lake to walk the red carpet.

Mayor Earl J. Glade renamed the town, Veronica Lake City and Joel McCrae was appointed Co-governor by the Utah legislature.

But by the time the film credits rolled, it was a different story.

- [James D'Arc] "Ramrod" was an atypical Western, especially for Utah audiences at the time.

Because Veronica Lake as Connie Dickason was a flinty, hard dame.

- [Veronica Lake] From now on, I'm going to make a life of my own.

And being a woman, I won't have to use guns.

- [Actor] Connie!

- [James V. D'Arc] She was ruthless.

She was fighting the men who were attempting to control her in her life.

And as a Salt Lake City reviewer once wrote, you've never seen a Western like this.

- [Narrator] Utah lawmakers denounced the film as "a fourth-class trashy picture."

And one state senator said, "A much more fitting title would be "Hamrod" instead of 'Ramrod.'"

- [Andrew Patrick Nelson] You may have an idea in your head about what a Western is, but that doesn't guarantee that the Western you're about to watch is going to conform to those ideas.

- [James V. D'Arc] I'm sure they would've preferred a film to be identified with their state, with the family values that could be enjoyed by everybody.

- [Andrew Patrick Nelson] Instead, you get a contemporary Western, a dark vision of the West.

There are post-war influences, kind of a new seriousness.

Introspective nature, an interest in character psychology that affects not just the Western, but all films.

- [Narrator] As the traditional Western began to shift, the actors known for playing heroes on horseback start looking for new roles, leading to some surprising casting choices.

- [James V. D'Arc] John Wayne is Genghis Khan?

As this 12th Century warlord?

- [Andrew Patrick Nelson] "The Conqueror": A Genghis Khan biopic that while successful in 1956 is now regarded as one of the worst.

- [Announcer] Under his heel, the cowering nations, in his arms, the unconquered woman.

He took what he wanted when he wanted it.

- [James V. D'Arc] Well, they chose Snow Canyon in the southwestern part of Utah near St. George to be the Gobi Desert.

So in 1955, local residents could stand on the edge of Snow Canyon and see local oxen bearing these Mongolian yurts down their cherished canyon.

- [Narrator] Though beloved, Utah's desert canyons have always held secrets.

Unknown at the time was that Snow Canyon soil had been polluted by radioactive fallout from a nuclear testing site 140 miles west in Nevada.

- [James V. D'Arc] The fallout was driven by the winds over this region in southwestern Utah.

- [Patrick Smith] They were unaware that a lot of this land was irradiated in a very dangerous way.

- [James V. D'Arc] That wouldn't show up until later with residents of St. George and the surrounding areas getting various kinds of cancer.

- [Narrator] After the movie was shot, it was reported that 91 of 222 crew members were diagnosed with cancer.

46 eventually died from the disease, including Director Dick Powell and stars, Susan Hayward, Agnes Moorehead, and Wayne.

- [James V. D'Arc] Now what complicates it even more, many of these actors were chain smokers, including John Wayne, but many other actors and crew members didn't.

- [Patrick Smith] And so there's a lot of discussion about, was filming in Snow Canyon specifically, the demise, or the beginning of the demise of a lot of famous filmmakers?

- [James V. D'Arc] That's one of the reasons why that film, other than being so bad it was good, having prominence to people in the 20th and 21st century.

- [Announcer] Four, three, two, one, ignition!

(upbeat music) - [Narrator] By the late 1960s, Westerns were fading from the A-list of the silver screen.

As society embraced a new era, the technology that sent a man to the moon left the wagon train in the dust.

(upbeat music) - [Andrew Patrick Nelson] Well, what's interesting though is how filmmakers still see a potential in Utah that it could be new frontiers.

Suddenly, Utah, for example, can be a kind of post-apocalyptic, futuristic landscape.

- [James V. D'Arc] In "Planet of the Apes," you're prepared for something extraterrestrial or otherworldly as you see the spacecraft crashing into the waters of Lake Powell and then the men rowing through the sandstone canyons, which in fact was a reality at the time, it was otherworldly, Lake Powell was relatively new at that time.

Very few people knew how it looked, it's a perfect location and it was a location that actually dominated the human beings that were in it.

They were small, the landscape was massive and threatening.

In Stanley Kubrick's, "2001: A Space Odyssey," he deals with icons, and what could be a greater symbol of this Earth than Monument Valley?

(apes screaming) - [Andrew Patrick Nelson] If Utah's landscapes have always been kind of divorced from history, divorced from place, it shouldn't surprise us that as one form of popular culture begins to wane, other artists interested in other genres and forms are still able to look imaginatively at the landscape, be inspired and see new visions, fantastic frontiers, horrific frontiers that John Ford may have contemplated but certainly didn't actualize.

(upbeat music) Suddenly Utah, for example, it can become fertile ground for horror movies.

- [Actor] This used to be quite a place.

It's been deserted for a long time now.

- [Actress] Will you take me in?

- [Actor] My goodness, no, it isn't safe out there anymore.

- [Narrator] Utah's striking geography also had closeups in horror films.

Director Herk Harvey turned his lens on the abandoned Great Saltair, once a popular resort on the edge of the Great Salt Lake, it was the perfect eerie spot for his cult classic, "Carnival of Souls."

But it wouldn't be long before a dashing young actor would draw audiences back to the once beloved Western.

Starstruck by the beauty of a drive through the canyons near St. George, Robert Redford lobbied director George Roy Hill to film, "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid," in Utah rather than New Mexico.

(upbeat music) - [James V. D'Arc] There is a scene in that film where they're both going to Hole in the Wall, their secret hideout.

Paul Newman as Butch Cassidy is on the horse riding with the Sundance kid, Robert Redford, and he's saying, - [Paul Newman] Boy, you know, every time I see Hole in the Wall again, it's like seeing it fresh for the first time.

- [James V. D'Arc] Well, maybe that's what a lot of people who know Zion National Park or Monument Valley or the Coral Pink Sand Dunes or Bryce Canyon might say.

After seeing a Hollywood movie made in these areas, it helps them see it in a way that they didn't encounter it the first time.

- [Andrew Patrick Nelson] Redford becomes enamored with Utah.

He begins to purchase property in Utah and he makes a a very, I think, underappreciated film called, "Jeremiah Johnson."

It's about a man who wants to escape from society, who sees in the wilderness, the possibility of a new, more authentic life.

So we have the story that has resonance with Redford's story, visiting a place thinking, I can carve out a new better life in this wilderness.

So he not only thinks that Utah is a great place to live and maybe make the occasional movie, it would be a great place to bring other filmmakers to make movies here.

Maybe it would be a great place to bring people every year to watch movies.

- [Robert Redford] I wanted to be able to do projects that were different from the run of the mill.

That's how this thing started.

(upbeat music) I would drive back and forth from Colorado to California, I'd come through Utah, and I heard all these weird stories about Utah, you wanna stay out of there.

And I thought, really?

And instead what I found out was that this was an incredibly beautiful state and I found two acres since 1961.

And to me, it was a home.

When the institute started in 1980, suddenly I was putting together two things, place and community.

Storytelling needs a sense of place, I think it begins with a sense of place.

And I would hope that this place here, which is in pure nature, might have some positive effect on their storytelling.

- [Voice] Action!

- [Robert Redford] We were developing the skills of the artists, but that's when we realized there's no place for them to go because the mainstream was not allowing that space.

That led to the idea of a festival.

So at least they would gather once a year, look at each other's work and maybe, maybe if we were lucky, somebody else would come.

Okay, well, after five, six years somebody did come.

- [Narrator] The largest independent film festival in the world, Sundance brings tens of thousands of filmmakers and film lovers to the state every year.

In the wake of Redford's investment in Utah, an even wider variety of films come to the state.

"Forrest Gump," "Footloose" and "Dumb and Dumber" all shot scenes here, as did "Galaxy Quest" and "The Sandlot."

And movies attract other visitors.

Film tourist flock to Utah to experience the places they've seen on screen.

- [James V. D'Arc] They were drawn by the illusion that these motion pictures filmed in Utah created about that land, and they were there to participate in it.

There's a scene in Forrest Gump where Forrest is running and running and running and he finally gets to Monument Valley, turns around reverse shot, the camera dollies up and he looks at Monument Valley and says, - [Forrest Gump] I'm pretty tired.

I think I'll go home now.

- [James V. D'Arc] Is there any wonder that this is what people who have seen the movie and come to Utah as a tourist want to replicate themselves?

I think the reason why people respond to motion pictures is they fill a function that has been centuries, eons old.

In the Old West, what did they do?

They sat around the campfire and told stories.

The difference in the 20th and 21st Centuries is the mythology of storytelling switched from the campfire up onto the movie screen.

(upbeat music) - [Narrator] The mythology of Western storytelling takes a hard left turn in 1991 with "Thelma and Louise."

This time the outlaws are women who do not need a cowboy rescue and their trusty steed isn't a horse, it's a 1966 Thunderbird.

- [Andrew Patrick Nelson] In a way, "Thelma and Louise" embodies that sense that Ford was so good at conveying that on the one hand, the landscape held the promise of your emancipation, but it also harbored the potential for your destruction.

I mean, it's also aware of, the "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" narrative, the outlaws on the run, that is one of the seminal western narrative, and the characters, they almost can't help but become Western outlaws, and they meet the conventional Western outlaw end.

- [Crystal Bowden] My dad's definitely been a car collector my entire life.

One of the big movies with a lot of cars was "Thelma and Louise", that was when I was a kid.

And he still has actually several of the cars, he has one of the Thunderbirds that was in the movie.

He also has some of the cop cars, that was like definitely one of the biggest memories of my childhood in the film industry, I guess, is that we did get to go out on set with "Thelma and Louise" quite a bit, saw some of the big scenes, we got to see the semi explode, so pretty fun.

And yeah, and some of the cars did come home with my dad.

- [Larry Campbell] I didn't even know who Ridley was, and then they tell me that, that it's a movie called "Thelma and Louise," and I thought, oh boy, funny name for a movie.

And little did I know, it's the most famous movie I ever worked on.

- [Crystal Bowden] So I know you helped build these cars, but what led to them using a Thunderbird?

- [Larry Campbell] What led to the Thunderbird really was Ridley Scott.

And this car, the tail lights are sequential tail lights that when you turn the turn signal on, well it has a sequential tail light and it's the only year of the Thunderbird that had that.

And so that's why the '66 is what Ridley picked.

Then he wanted some kind of a turquoise color and we started out with that the Chevy Impala color, and then just started adding some yellow to it and ended up with what he liked for the color of the car.

They wanted to send those cars off the cliff, the special effects guys felt like they had to be going 90 miles an hour to hit the edge of the river, so I imagine they were going somewhere between 90 and hundred miles an hour when they left the end of the rail.

I had stripped the cars of anything that would contaminate the river.

I'd cut the brake lines out, I'd taken everything, there was no engines or anything in them and made them as clean as we could.

And they went in and got them with helicopters and lifted them out.

It's movie magic, all the things you don't know unless you're there working on them.

- [Narrator] "Thelma and Louise's" catapult from Moab Utah's jaw-dropping Fossil Point may be one of the most iconic moments in American movie history.

It's a scene so seminal that Fossil Point's name was changed to "Thelma and Louise" Point.

But it takes more than panoramic views to draw and keep Hollywood's attention.

- [Andrew Patrick Nelson] It's not enough to just have a great landscape, right?

You have to have the people there.

And in Utah we have an industrious population, hardworking, but also incredibly creative.

And there is a support in the state for art and culture that you don't find in most other places.

- [Bega Metzner] The people who work here who are local crew are some of the best and have been in the industry a really long time and really know what they're doing.

- [Bego Gerhart] We spent a lot of time with people over the edge, climbing or rappelling or swinging around.

I was around when "Lone Ranger" came to town, I got a job 'cause they built this big tower right on the edge of Dead Horse Point and I mean on the edge.

And I had to keep the tower from tipping over.

The security of the Spirit Tower was all about straps and climbing equipment 'cause there's a lot of cracks around.

Put it in the cracks and laced it all together so it's strong enough, and it didn't fall over.

And then there was a few times when Hollywood would bring the talent, but the talent had no talent for this kind of stuff.

So then you'd wind up teaching them how to do what they said they could do.

But we scared off a couple of talents, too far off the ground for them.

Yeah, "Mission Impossible: 2" had Cruise doing his own stunts.

And I gotta hand it to him because I know exactly where he did what he did, and it's pretty airy.

But once again, he was never not attached to a rope and they took all the ropes out in post.

- [Narrator] Local crews also know not to underestimate the challenges of Utah's changeable climate.

The rain, wind, snow, and heat that shaped canyons and rock spires can be a punishing place to make films.

- [Michael "Miso" Tunks] During July and August here when it's over a hundred degrees, the grips and electricians would come down and they'd be okay for a day or two, and then they would just wither under the heat.

So that's the difference about working here, is that Mother Nature's running the show here.

- [Narrator] Sometimes, Mother Nature needed their protection.

Millions of years in the making, Utah's geographic features are both rugged and fragile and in the world building of movies, each footprint or tire track has the potential to harm the land Hollywood wants to capture and Utahans hold dear.

- [Bego Gerhart] Well, the locals caught onto that pretty soon.

And we got a thing called a film monitor program going where a company would have to hire a monitor who kept everything from ruining the landscape.

- [Bega Metzner] The quote that I have from Ridley Scott, "I have seen more wonderful and buried scenery in a single day in Moab than any other day I have scouted."

Seeing this landscape for the first time, it sits in your bones in a different way than anything.

- [Crystal Bowden] Yeah, I get asked that all the time, does this ever get old?

And no, it really doesn't.

I have my camera out everywhere I go, I have had countless crews out here that have literally been brought to tears when I show them a location.

They've just never seen anything like this.

There's times that we're on a night shoot, and they've never seen the stars.

- [Narrator] Now, a century after Westerns put Utah on the map, actor and director, Kevin Costner is reviving the tradition on an epic scale.

Costner chose the Utah/Arizona border as the backdrop for "Horizon," a four-part story of Western expansion.

[Kevin Costner] I remember bringing people to this location Derek and Jimmy, we had to come through a little road over there and it sits down in a valley that while it's green, it was dead, dead when we came here and it and it just didn't feel exactly right.

And so we're walking and there was some grumbling, to be quite honest, I don't know what we're doing out here, I think people were tired.

I understand that location scouting is hard.

And then about right there, they began to feel something.

And then when they got to the edge, they felt that river and those trees and the bend in the river and the big rock that's been there for thousands of years.

And there's not a doubt in my mind that the first people would stand in these same places.

On our scout, when we got about right here, everybody said, "Okay, okay."

(gentle music) - [Narrator] At the end of a winding, bumpy dirt road, Costner found a sprawling cattle ranch in Apple Valley to film his imagined West.

- [Willie Jessop] The first reaction when they approached us about filming here was just the uncertainty of not ever being around the film industry.

The questions they ask is, "Has anyone ever filmed here before?"

And I think the only people that had it was the Native Americans and pioneers and us.

- [Narrator] To replicate the open range, miles of cattle fencing was torn out.

The Peacemaker's barn became the hub for costumes, hair and makeup.

One field hosted the actors' trailers, another, a buffalo corral.

Horses and cattle were shipped in by the dozens.

- [Willie Jessop] And the magnitude of that was completely shocking if you've never been around a Hollywood production where I thought it was all fake and the horses aren't fake, the cows aren't fake and the action is intense, all that was complete shock and awe.

And it seemed like they brought in so much energy and money that directly affected the day-to-day lives of the people that live here.

Just a tremendous blessing to everyone in the valley.

- [Narrator] Local residents and businesses aren't the only ones benefiting from productions in the area.

Students from Utah Tech University in St. George have found a direct pathway to work in the film industry.

- [Joyce Kelly] We have 200 students in film school at Utah Tech University.

There's 4,000 film students in college throughout the state of Utah.

- [Patrick Smith] You're gonna see a lot of work leaving Los Angeles because it's no longer the best place to shoot.

And so I think this new model of, we've got a little Hollywood in Utah and we've got a little Hollywood in Georgia and one in Austin, that to me, seems more sustainable.

And so yeah, I think maybe that's our goal here is let's make this the hotspot here and let's keep it really, really healthy and alive.

- [Ben Vasion] It's incredible, especially for me since I'm from a small town in Washington State and this past summer, I worked on "Horizon: American Saga - Chapter 2."

- [Willie Jessop] The high energy of people with jobs being paid, people that was loving to be here.

And you saw that in the excitement from the cowboys.

You could feel it in the animals, you could go down, and the energy in the air was just this great day of excitement.

The movies are in town and it's not what we're watching, it's what you're making.

And that energy was just beyond a way to describe, it was just so exciting.

And then when they were done, they put everything back better than they found it.

- [Patrick Smith] You need three things really to make an industry function and stay where it is.

You need talent, you need to train the talent and then you need infrastructure and all of which in the last maybe two or three years have started to percolate and and materialize here.

So I think we're in an interesting moment.

- [Joyce Kelly] Kevin came to me one day and he did say he was interested to build a studio here.

And early on, I got that dream.

And early on, I knew I wanted Washington County to be a part of that.

- [Ben Vasion] I'm extremely excited about the studio.

I probably won't have the need to hopefully move to LA or anywhere else, I can stay here in Utah.

- [Patrick Smith] Everywhere he has gone, he has shifted the landscape of that place.

So if you look at where they shot, "Field of Dreams," the tourism there is out of control still because of that one film.

You look in Montana where they shot "Yellowstone," and the same thing is happening.

Just from tourism alone, they think that they added another 700 million annually in revenue for the state.

- [Willie Jessop] It was almost like you take it for granted what you see every day, you don't feel that it's any different than what you've had for 20 or 30 years.

And suddenly you got a place, somebody as high caliber as Kevin and Luke Wilson and the people that he brought in here, and suddenly, there's this great sense of pride as to what southern Utah really was.

And to be able to see all of a sudden, those mountains on a big screen, it's just jaw dropping.

It was always here, but Hollywood really did show us what we have.

- [Narrator] What Utah has had from the beginning is a cinematic future as limitless as its landscapes.

From Ford to Redford and Costner, filmmakers have come here to use the land not just as stunning backdrops, but as a central character in their stories of the imagined west.

Hollywood's Utah legacy reaches well beyond what was captured on screen.

Today, Utah filmmakers, crew and students are shaping a new western story, one that includes rich, nuanced perspectives told through fresh voices.

- [Dustin Tahmahkera] You have countless Native and indigenous filmmakers from around the world telling stories that don't always have to be reactive to the anti-indigenous policies and to that kind of history, but proactive, having the freedom to tell and to share the stories that we want to tell.

My late auntie said that when our stories come together, that that's when the magic happens.

(upbeat music) - [Actress] And your shoes.

- [Andrew Patrick Nelson] And what that hopefully does is set the stage for the emergence of something like a Utah film where it isn't always going to be when Hollywood came to town and we helped them out for a little bit.

Maybe we reach a point where something like a Utah film does emerge and there are opportunities for filmmakers in Utah to begin to tell Utah stories that will be appealing as Utah stories for not only the entire nation, but the world.

- [James V. D'Arc] The land is not going anywhere, but filmmakers are looking at Utah with eyes anew to find new uses, new interpretations, seeing it fresh for the first time.

- [Announcer] Hollywood in Utah is made possible in part by the George S. and Dolores Dore Eccles Foundation, the Cleone Peterson Eccles Endowment Fund, and by the contributions to PBS Utah from viewers like you.

Thank you.

(upbeat music)