Stagecoach

John Ford - 1939
Obviously, it's a masterpiece; of simplicity.
Ford uses long shots, with a pretty deep focus, especially noticeable in those rooms which is cramps up the rooms are also shot from a pretty low angle). It can even seem a little aggressive. From this framing, which he uses with great restraint, Ford moves in closer to ones and twos.
The remarkable thing I found here about Ford's mis-en-scene is that it is an entirely mediated world. Ford has next to no shots that just show a person. It is always a person with a background of a place, other people, with the wind blowing, with dirt on their faces. Everyone is from their environment, is their environment is what they are in that shot. This combines with that masterful simplicity of direction, in that every cut and take is for a reason, portraying through purely cinematic means (Kuleshov, usually) relationships and so on, by looks). Ford can be very reticent about this, because every shot is allowed to have a meaning, so when a shot comes, even if the acting in it is laconic, we understand.
For the particular look of the images we have some really strong backlighting; lots of halos, which add to the beautiful sillouhettes and grand shafts of light that comes across the frame of the film, as though the locations were cathedrals.
Another remarkable thing about this film is how many 'classical continuity rules' it breaks. the apache showdown, for example, is constantly breaking the line, the direction of movement across the screen and so on. How the stage itself is actually shot inside doesn't stick, as far as I could tell in my one viewing, to a strict continuity line. Indeed, for perhaps obvious reasons, we never even get an establishing shot of it.
Ford uses much shorter scenes than, say, Hawks. He is pretty narrative driven, not much mucking about, but the narrative does remain very simple, with more and more obstacles. Holding the Apache back so long is a strong moment, and it seems that even in 1939 Ford isn't quite comfortable with basing his film around the crass racism that is obviously their in the plit; the social miseries of the coach party are just as important.
For all the 'boys own' side, the relationships are really pretty grown-up, perhaps due to this reticence. Their isn't a great epiphany (the alcholic seems happy at the end to keep drinking...), people remain uncertain with each other.