1. For a Few Dollars More - Even though The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly might be a better movie, it bugged me when it came out that Lee Van Cleef was the bad guy, after being the good guy in this one. Plus, lighting a match on Kinski's hump must be recognized.
2. Valdez Is Coming - Elmore Leonard. Or Ulzana's Raid could go here, because I like the aging Burt Lancaster as a cowboy and the Apache lore is accurate.
3. Shane - It has held up for me. And it's got Palance.
4. Savage Frontier - Or anything else with Allan Rocky Lane in it. He was my favorite cowboy of the Saturday morning B westerns. Beats out Lash Larue, Whip Wilson, and of course Gene Autry. And don't even mention Roy Rogers.
5. Little Big Man
But whoa... Just went for a walk and thought about the 5 westerns that I rewatch the most often, which would figure to be my favorites, and it turns out to be 5 different ones:
1. The Outlaw Josey Wales - Eastwood as a real person, taking revenge.
2. Quigley Down Under - Tom Selleck for whatever reason is my favorite cowboy.
3. Lonesome Dove - I'm calling it a movie. With the book, prequels and sequel (James Garner even better than Tommy Lee Jones), I'm calling it great.
4. Red Sun - Mifune and Bronson together.
5. The Quick and the Dead - Westerns are all about shootouts and this is the shootout king. And if Hackman didn't deserve what he got in Unforgiven, he definitely deserves it here.