frontier expansion

His iconic Westerns like 'The Searchers' and 'My Darling Clementine' are foundational explorations of American frontier expansion, settler colonialism, and the violent displacement of Native peoples.

His spaghetti Westerns revolutionized the genre by presenting the frontier as a morally ambiguous space where civilization and lawlessness collide in complex, mythic ways.

His films like 'Aguirre, the Wrath of God' and 'Fitzcarraldo' depict frontier expansion as obsessive, destructive quests that reveal humanity's hubris against untamed nature and indigenous worlds.