This the first of what I would deem the western genre. It is literally Cowboys vs. Indians film made in the escapist cinema trend with the Western replacing the Gangster picture and swashbuckler as a much larger subgenre of Escapist cinema. The filmmaking is flawless with the executors of the films of this time successfully completing all technical requirements without issue so the audience member is no longer thinking about the film medium but totally transported across the fourth wall into the world of the story. The acting is now becoming subtle although a little more bold in terms of how men are shown.
John Wayne is burly man's man who definitely goes against the more feminine man of the musical or romantic comedy 1930’s films. There is a sense of "ruggedness" and violence defining what it means to be a man emerging onto the scene as we enter WW2.
This film was very good at bringing violence to the screen in a way that combines it with a sense of revenge and justice in a wild world. Thus it notably established the western genre.
What's most notable about this film is a shift towards the lone, individual, strong man in American cinema that would start showing up post WW2 to create a gender divide in the culture and the 1950’s “strong american man” culture. You're beginning to see the creation of the "anti-hero" an individual who sometimes has to do bad things to achieve common good.