FILM REVIEW OF ''KID RODELO" (U.S.-SPANISH 1966)

"Four Guns to the Border" director Richard Carlson helmed this thoroughly lackluster Louis L'Amour western "Kid Rodelo,"(** OUT OF ****) with Don Murray, Janet Leigh, and Oscar-winner Broderick Crawford.  This straightforward, humorless, horse opera concerns survival of the fittest on the frontier. Appropriately enough, lean, handsome Murray is cast as the virtuous hero, while paunchy, gravel-voiced Crawford excels a treacherous outlaw with an itchy trigger finger. Eventually, these two wind up on a rugged desert trail transporting $50-thousand in gold with remorseless Yaqui Indians shadowing them like vultures. The prison hires Yaquis to bring back escaped prisoners, and the Yaquis usually bring them back face down and draped across the saddles of their horses. Unlike the Rangers, the Yaquis need not bother with the same pesky jurisdictional issues that the Rangers must contend with when crossing the border into Mexico.  These Yaquis are particularly proficient at what they do, and their leader, Cavalry Hat (José Villasante of “Django the Condemned”), covets the hero's boots.  The only thing that distinguishes this western is the eponymous hero’s knowledge of desert plants, specifically cholla cactus with their poisonous spines which can lame a horse.

Kid Rodelo (Don Murray of "From Hell to Texas") has been released after serving a year inside Yuma Territorial Prison, while villainous Joe Harbin (Broderick Crawford of "All the King's Men") sweats out a life sentence because he shot his partner. Meantime, Harbin's accomplice, Thomas Reese (José Nieto of "Dr. Zhivago"), hatches a plan to break out of Yuma. He has stolen two wooden matches from the kitchen. Harbin and he toil in the stone quarry where they hammer holes into the rocks with a drill to insert dynamite to blast the formation. They plant some extra sticks of dynamite and all hell cuts loose. In the novel, Joe's accomplice is named Tom Badger and he survives until the finale, whereas Reese dies not long after they break out of prison. Anyway, Harbin and Reese take the Warden (Emilio Rodríguez) as a hostage to make good their escape. They shoot their way out of Yuma using the Warden as a shield and dump him once they have gotten away.

Now, they light out in hot pursuit of the Kid who has caught a ride with another some other suspicious characters who are conveniently watching for him to show up.  Link (Richard Carlson of "Creature from the Black Lagoon") and his girlfriend Nora (Janet Leigh of "Psycho") are waiting for the Kid as he trudges on foot along the trail from the prison.  Link wants the money, too, and he has hired another gunslinger, sleazy Balas (Julio Peña), to help him.  After they reach a largely abandoned town, Link and Balas enter a house and find a box concealed beneath the wooden floorboards.  They get into an argument over Balas' percentage of the loot.  The greedy Balas insists on a greater share and guns down Link without a qualm.  Later, Balas joins Joe after he guns down Reese, but they don’t trust each other.  Gopher (Alfonso Sanfélix) dies later after they have crossed the border.  Balas takes the gold piece that Joe gave Gopher after he made him a partner.  Balas suggests that they flip for the coin, and Joe grabs the coin before it hits the ground and appropriates it as his coin.  Eventually, Cavalry Hat picks off Joe as he is about to gun down Rodelo.

This threadbare oater was lensed on location in rugged Spain.  Strangely enough, the pinch-penny producers filmed this outdoors yarn in black & white.  This Paramount Pictures release seems unusual because most westerns by that time were photographed in color, even those old timer oaters that producer A.C. Lyles made.  "Badman's Territory" scenarist Jack Natteford departs drastically from the source material in at least one crucial respect, and this change might upset hardcore, morally rigidly, L’Amour fans.  For example, Link is named Jake, and Balas is named Clint.  Nevertheless, this is nothing compared with the outcome of the action and the disposal of the gold.  The characters amount largely to stereotypes as they did in the novel.  Like most L'Amour heroes, Kid Rodelo knows his way around the desert like an expert, particularly the whereabouts of water holes.  Carlson and Natteford exploit Rodelo’s environmental familiarity, such as knowing about the flora and fauna to keep them alive.  The performances are okay, while Leigh appears as little more than window dressing.  She does do one important thing at the end. This gritty western tries to imitate the Spaghetti westerns, but Carlson imparts little color or charisma.  The villains are cutthroat dastards, willing to kill anybody to keep from sharing the loot.  The simple Johnny Douglas orchestral score represents an exercise in minimalism.  The finale on the shore of the Gulf of Baja differs from most westerns because you don’t often see the action end on a beach.  Altogether, as a film, “Kid Rodelo” doesn’t surpass the L’Amour novel despite the scenic splendor of the Spanish landscape and the obvious amoral Spaghetti western influence on the ending.  The chief difference between the novel and the film is Rodelo planned to return the gold to the authorities to clear his name for his supposed part in the robbery.  In the novel, he was arrested because he was caught riding with Joe, but Rodelo didn’t know anything about the robbery. The film concludes with Rodelo and Nora bathing in the surf then walking off as permanent partners.

FILM REVIEW OF ''THE HALLELUJAH TRAIL" (1965)

In his well-researched landmark biography of John Sturges, film critic Glenn Lovall points out the failure of “The Hallelujah Trail” at the box office forced John Sturges back into being a contract director. Unfortunately, this ambitious, $ 7 million dollar, two-hour and forty-five minute western extravaganza did prove to be Sturges’ undoing.  Sadly, according to Wikipedia, this United Artists’ release generated only $4 million during its initial release. Nevertheless, I’ve always thought it was an incredibly hilarious and splendidly staged western comedy.  The closest that Sturges had come to making a comedy was the Frank Sinatra & Dean Martin western “Sergeants Three,” but “The Hallelujah Trail” (*** OUT OF ****) was far from anything that “The Magnificent Seven” helmer had ever undertaken.  Sturges assembled a first-rate cast.  Burt Lancaster, who starred in Sturges’ first big western “Gunfight at the O.K. Corral,” took top billing as Colonel Thaddeus Gearhart.  Gearhart was a traditional, straight-laced U.S. Calvary commander who is in charge of a frontier fort who has a beautiful daughter, Louise Gearhart (Pamela Tiffin of “One, Two, Three”), who is hopelessly in love with an officer, Captain Paul Slater (Jim Hutton of “Major Dundee”), who serves under Gearhart at the fort.  At one point, Gearhart finds Slater and his daughter rolling around on his bear skin rug.  The hugely funny western takes advantage of the usual elements of most standard-issue oaters.  There is the inevitable clash between the U.S. Calvary and the Native Americans.  Similarly, the alcoholic frontiersmen ruffle the feathers of the Ladies of the Temperance Movement.  This sprawling, ‘battle of the sexes’ western brings together all these parties for an incredible finale in a swamp.

John Gay’s complicated screenplay based on William Gulick’s entertaining western novel concerns the efforts of desperate Denver merchants inspired by 'Oracle' Jones (Donald Pleasence of “The Great Escape”) to get a wagon train of liquor to them before they exhaust their supplies for the winter.  Signs indicate that the winter will be the worst in years, and the merchants refuse to run out of suds.  Moreover, a citizens’ committee shares the merchant’s anxiety.  Meantime, beer merchant Frank Wallingham (Brian Keith of “The Wind and the Lion”) organizes an emergency shipment of booze to Denver. However, he must contend with some obnoxious Irish teamsters, led by Kevin O'Flaherty (Tom Stern of “Clay Pigeon”), who feel he is exploiting them.  O'Flaherty constantly addresses Wallingham as “your lordship,” and Wallingham grumbles about it the entire time.  Of course, when the Indians learn about this huge shipment of liquor, they decide to help themselves to it.  Walllingham demands that Gearhart provide an escort to safeguard his booze from Chief Walks-Stooped-Over (Martin Landau of “Impossible Impossible”) as well as Chief Five Barrels (Robert J. Wilke of “The Magnificent Seven”) and they bring along their respective tribes.  If contending with Indians armed with Winchester repeating rifles weren’t enough of a challenge, Wallingham faces opposition from a well-known Temperance champion, Miss Cora Templeton Massingale (Lee Remick of “The Omen”), who just happens to be holding meetings at Gearhart’s fort.  Massingale decides to intercept the shipment of suds and destroy the cargo, and Gearhart’s daughter joins her. Naturally, an upset Colonel Gearhart decides Sergeant Buell (John Anderson of “The Satan Bug”) and he must provide an escort for these dames to keep them out of harm’s way.

Lancaster is absolutely brilliant as the square-jawed, Calvary colonel who must supervise everything in this massive sagebrusher. His comic timing is impeccable.  The scenes he has with Lee Remick will keep you in stitches as she manipulates him skillfully throughout the narrative. The contempt these two characters have for each other inevitably brings them together in the long run. The dialogue is crisp and smirk inducing, especially when Gearhart reprimands his top sergeant to his lack of Army strategy.  Sturges doesn’t slight anybody, and he gives some rather unusual parts to actors who had never done anything like these roles. Martin Landau is terrifically amusing as Chief Who Walks Stooped Over, and British actor Donald Pleasence, who eventually played villain in “Will Penny,” is cast as a barfly.  Crowning all these wonderful performances is Elmer Bernstein’s impressive orchestral score and “Satan Bug” lenser Robert Surtee’s radiant widescreen photography. In addition to “The Hallelujah Trail,” Surtees photographed not only “Escape from Fort Bravo,” but also “The Law and Jake Wade” for Sturges.  If you enjoy happily-ever-after comedies where the performers behave as if they were is a serious dramatic saga, “The Hallelujah Trail” qualifies as ideal entertainment.

FILM REVIEW OF "JACK RYAN: SHADOW RECRUIT" (2014)

Chris Pine follows in the footsteps of Ben Affleck, Harrison Ford, and Alec Baldwin as the fourth actor to breathe life into Tom Clancy’s best-selling, literary hero Jack Ryan.  Happily, Pine handles himself well both in the action scenes as well as the dialogue interludes.  Sadly, neither freshman scribe Adam Cozad nor seasoned “Jurassic Park” scenarist David Koepp provide Pine with anything quotable.  Meanwhile, Pine’s chief adversary, played by Shakespearean trained thespian Kenneth Branagh, lacks not only memorable lines but also intimidating scenes.  Branagh’s best bad guy scene shows him sticking a white LED light bulb into the leading lady’s mouth.  Dreadful consequences, he warns our emaciated heroine, will ensue if he shatters the bulb in her mouth.  Meantime, as director, Branagh regales us with beautiful scenery both urban and rural, inevitable automotive chases continents apart, immaculate shoot-outs between Russian and CIA gunmen, and our hero in close-quarters combat with adversaries.  Branagh doesn’t orchestrate these activities with his usual finesse.  Essentially, the $60-million dollar “Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit” (** OUT OF ****) qualifies as a derivative espionage thriller with most of the clichés intact.   One of the worst clichés involves slender Keira Knightley posing as a helpless damsel-in-distress.  You know from the moment that you see her that she is going to be the tennis ball heroine who gets swatted back and forth between the hero and the villains.  The wicked Branagh plots an appropriately horrific 9/11 attack on Manhattan that will set off another devastating global economic depression.  Branagh’s millionaire Russian villain hopes this geopolitical strategy will destroy America.  Comparatively, Batman’s arch foe Bane pulled a similar stunt in “The Dark Knight Rises.”  If it succeeds in doing nothing else, “Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit” resurrects the long dormant enmity between the Russians with a retro-Cold War agenda and the United States.
 

For the record, “Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit” doesn’t pick up the narrative thread where either “Clear and Present Danger” (1994) or “The Sum of All Fears” (2002) faded out.  “The Hunt for Red October,” “Patriotic Games,” and “Clear and Present Danger” constituted the first series of Jack Ryan’s cinematic escapades.  Incidentally, Paramount tampered with Clancy’s literary chronology because the novel “Patriotic Games” preceded “The Hunt for Red October.”  Meanwhile, “The Sum of All Fears” (2002) amounted to a franchise reboot with Ben Affleck.  Director Kenneth Branagh’s spy saga has no connection to the previous four films.  Moreover, the filmmakers didn’t adapt a Tom Clancy novel to serve as the basis for “Jack Ryan.”  The bestselling author passed away in October 2013.  Reportedly, Paramount Pictures hired Adam Cozad to rewrite his own screenplay "Dubai" and convert the hero into Jack Ryan.  Branagh and scenarists David Koepp and Cozad have retained our hero’s financial background and his terrifying helicopter accident.  Since this is another ‘origins’ reboot, Paramount has altered the dates.  Indeed, renegade Russians are behaving like their Communistic ancestors before the empire collapsed in 1989.  You might go so far as to describe this movie as a retro-Cold War saga pitting Uncle Sam against the Russian Bear.  

The first time we see our protagonist Jack Ryan (Chris Pine of “Star Trek”) he is catching forty winks on a bench.  Ryan has enrolled as a student at the London School of Economics.  As he is ambling back to class, Jack notices a commotion around a television set.  The year is 2001, and the unbelievable has happened to the World Trade Center.  Stunned by this tragic turn of events, Ryan joins the Marine Corps and becomes a jarhead lieutenant.  Narrowly, he escapes death when enemy mortar fire brings down the helicopter that he is riding in over Afghanistan.  Badly smashed up from the attack, Jack struggles to walk again.  A pretty physical therapist, Cathy Muller (Keira Knightley of “Domino”), enters Jack’s life and motivates him to keep on trying.  Jack and Cathy know they are made for each other, but their jobs create tension and suspicion.  CIA Agent Thomas Harper (Kevin Costner of “No Way Out”) recruits Ryan after our protagonist proves he can walk again.  Harper sends Jack back to school for a Ph.D. in Economics.  Harper never takes his eye off Ryan.

A decade later, Harper plants Ryan as an agency mole on Wall Street to ferret out possible terrorist activities in the financial community.  Suspecting that Soviet Afghan war veteran Viktor Cheverin (Kenneth Branagh of “Hamlet”) has been manipulating finances with evil designs, Jack flies to Russia to confront him.  Jack’s life changes irrevocably after he lands in Moscow.  Harper watches over Ryan like a guardian angel from the shadows.  A first-rate sniper, Harper has no qualms about shooting anybody who interferes with Ryan.  After their initial meeting, Viktor invites Jack to dinner at a restaurant across the street from his headquarters.  At the last minute, Jack’s fiancée Cathy surprises them both with her presence.  Cathy fascinates Viktor so much so that he forgets about Ryan.  While Viktor flirts with Cathy, Ryan burglarizes Viktor’s computers to get the goods on him.  Of course, the Russians get wise to Ryan, but he escapes without incriminating himself.

The best thing about “Jack Ryan” is that Branagh maintains headlong momentum despite all of the predictable, standard-issue, melodramatics.  Unhappily, most of what occurs here has been done before with greater flair by the James Bond spectacles and the Jason Bourne thrillers.  The final scenes in New York City generate a modicum of suspense as our hero tangles with a committed terrorist who wants to blow Wall Street to smithereens.  Again, we’ve seen this kind of hair-raising nonsense too often for it shake us up.  Kevin Costner seems squandered in a co-starring role as an agency spook who recruits Jack.  Vic Armstrong and his colleagues perform several tough stunts, but “Jack Ryan Shadow Recruit” suffers from an overwhelming sense of déjà vu.  This is probably the least entertaining Jack Ryan outing.

FILM REVIEW OF "TWO MULES FOR SISTER SARA" (1970)

"Invasion of the Body Snatchers" director Don Siegel and blacklisted Hollywood scenarist Albert Maltz appropriated an unproduced Budd Boetticher script and turned it into a lively little western shoot'em up called "Two Mules for Sister Sara." Earlier, Eastwood and Siegel had collaborated as star and director on "Coogan's Bluff," and this Universal Studios film release, set against the French Revolution in Mexico, marked their second collaboration.  Later, the two would make the iconic "Dirty Harry" and conclude their work together on the Paramount Pictures' release of "Escape from Alcatraz." "Two Mules for Sister Sara" (*** out of ****) isn't their best outing together, but it has several wonderful scenes.  Wearing a stylist leather hat, Clint appears as tough and unshaven as he did in his Sergio Leone Spaghetti oaters. Now, however, he plays a swift-shooting, soldier-of-fortune named Hogan. This blood-splattered but amusing western comedy/drama teams Eastwood's gimlet-eyed adventurer up with an impious Catholic nun, Sister Sara (Shirley MacLaine of "Sweet Charity"), in Mexico during the late 1860s when the Mexicans were ridding themselves of the yoke of French oppression. In the original Boetticher script, the setting was the Mexican Revolution rather than the French Revolution, Boetticher's nun character was entirely different. Incidentally, sources say Boetticher hated the "Two Mules." Indeed, "Two Mules" contains a surprise ending, and the constant bickering between Hogan and Sara makes for many hilarious moments. Eastwood and MacLaine are charismatic throughout. The film is visually splendid to gaze at thanks to Oscar nominee Gabriel Figueroa's gorgeous cinematography. Consider the way he skewers his set-ups sometimes for a cool effect. The encounter with the Indians boasts some interesting camera angles, especially when Clint topples from the saddle.

"Two Mules for Sister Sara" unfolds with Hogan (Clint Eastwood of "Hang'em High") is riding one horse and leading another loaded with supplies though the dangerous Mexican wilderness. The leisurely title sequence features a variety of critters starting with a hoot owl, followed by a fish gliding through a stream, a cougar poised and panting on a rock ledge, a snake slithering across the sand, and concludes with Hogan's horse crushing a tarantula under its shod horn. Our protagonist is minding his own business when he stumbles accidentally onto three drunken guys and a naked woman in the middle of nowhere. The gunmen offer to share the lady, but then treacherously try to kill our hero over her. Hogan guns two of them down with relative ease, while the third seizes the woman and uses her as a shield. Hogan ignites a stick of TNT and slings it at them. The third man fires at Hogan and flees in desperation to avoid getting blown to bites. Hogan drops him with three shots in the back. He descends the slope, snuffs out the burning fuse on the stick of dynamite, and suggests that the naked lady put on her clothes unless she wants to be sunburnt to hell and gone.  Afterward, Hogan discovers the naked lady is in reality a Catholic nun! He helps her bury them and then blows his cool when he sees Sara sprinkling his canteen on their graves. He snatches his canteen and suggests that she bless them without water since they are in the middle of an arid region. Things turn even weirder when a column of French cavalry show up and Sara goes berserk. She cannot let the French capture her, she explains rapidly to Hogan, because she is working in league with the revolutionaries. Hogan unearths the dead killers and sends them off at a gallop on the backs of their ponies for the French to pursue. Hogan and Sara slip away.

Hogan has come to Mexico to help destroy a French prison on Bastille Day, and he winds up escorting Sara to the prison town. Before he reaches the prison, Hogan gets really drunk after the Yaquis shoot an arrow into his shoulder. Sister Sara uses the reflection off her cross to drive the superstitious Indians away. The scene where she has to remove the arrow from Hogan's shoulder is pretty gritty stuff. Hogan gets himself lickered up to tolerate the pain while Sara digs around the shaft of the arrow and carves a groove in it so he can put gunpowder on it, fire it up, and push it out the back of his shoulder. This scene can be rough on the squeamish. Anyway, since he is tanked enough up to withstand the pain of the arrow removal, Hogan has a difficult time with a train that he is supposed to destroy. He cannot climb the trestle to lash sticks of TNT to the pylons so he convinces Sara--who has a fear of heights--to climb up it and attach the explosives. It is ironic that a nun would hate to ascend and this plays into the big revelation at fade-out. Here comes the train and Hogan misses every shot until Sara hauls off and decks him. He recovers and nails one stick of dynamite and the entire structure collapses under the train.

The big finale finds Hogan and Sara along with some revolutionaries staging an attack on a French fortress. Siegel turns this scene into a massive combat sequence with Hogan demonstrating that he is an excellent shot with either hand. There are a couple of bloody shots in this battle sequence.  A guy gets a machete in the head is an example.  As usual, Clint is a cool as a cucumber. The big surprise--which I won't reveal--concerns the way that Hogan's relationship with Sara concludes. "Two Mules for Sister Sara" is part shoot'em western and part romance and together a very amusing adventure opus.

ONLY THE VALIANT (1951) ***1/2 OUT OF ****

 "Only the Valiant" qualifies as a pretty gritty western. This straightforward U.S. Cavalry versus Apaches saga is a solemn suicide mission with minimal humor. “Them” director Gordon Douglas stages this grim, harrowing, outdoors epic with gusto, and a brawny cast of hard-bitten hellions sweating bullets when they aren’t shooting them surrounds leading man Gregory Peck. Lon Chaney, Jr., Neville Brand, Ward Bond, Jeff Corey, and Steve Brodie constitute some of the cast. Ostensibly, "Colorado Territory" scenarist Edmund H. North and "A Place in the Sun" scribe Harry Brown adapted western filmmaker Charles Marquis Warren's taut novel. Basically, a squad of die-hard cavalrymen receive orders to prevent bloodthirsty Apaches from massacring defenseless white settlers. The chief dramatic complication is these cavalrymen don’t stand a chance in Hades. North and Brown adhere to Warren's novel for the most part. The last-minute revelation--when it seems our heroes are doom—is a corker! This frontier tale drums up a palatable aura of claustrophobia in the latter half of its 105-minute runtime. The stark black & white cinematography of "Going My Way" lenser Lionel Linden endows this adventure with a grim look that enhances its tension. Actor Michael Ansara, who later played the antagonist in "Guns of the Magnificent Seven," is extremely effective in a small role as the hated Apache leader Tucsos.

"Only the Valiant" opens with Army Scout Joe Harmony (Jeff Corey of “True Grit”) providing expository voice-over narration. "This is my stamping ground. I'm a scout for the Army. Had my work cut out for me for a long time. Behind that pass there is the whole 'Pache nation. (There is a map of the territory with the Flinthead Mountains stretching across the screen with a bottleneck pass.) They used to come swarming out of the pass killing everything in sight. Then we built a fort—Fort Invincible. It plugged up the pass, just like a cork in a bottle. Things was fine for a while. But them 'Paches is pretty smart. One day the bottle blew the cork plum apart." We are shown the burning remains of Fort Invincible with a dead man pinned to a stockade wall and a lance sticking out of his belly. Hidebound Captain Richard Lance (Gregory Peck of "12 O’Clock High") and his troopers charge in on horseback and capture Tucsos, and Joe Harmony (Jeff Corey of "True Grit") wants to shoot him on the spot. Harmony points out Tucsos is "the fella that started this whole business." Lance intervenes, "The Army doesn't shoot prisoners, Joe." Predictably, Harmony is aghast. "He's no common injun. He's just as near to a god as a fella can get. If you shoot him now, things will quiet down. Without Tucsos stirring them up, the rest of those Indians will get reasonable, just as fast as they can. You take him in alive, you'll have every 'Pache in the territory coming after him. We have had three years of this, you can stop it now." Just as predictably, Captain Lance refuses to kill Tucsos, and his decision to take the Apache back sets things into action.

Colonel Drum (Herbert Heyes of "Union Station") surprises Lance when he tells him Tucsos should have killed. As it is, they need to get Tucsos to another post. Everybody from the troopers to Joe Harmony know taking Tucsos to Fort Grant is asking him to die. The Apaches are poised like predators in the mountains, and the fort is blatantly under strength. Meantime, Douglas introduces us to Captain Eversham's daughter, Cathy (Barbara Payton of "Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye") and young Lieutenant William Holloway (Gig Young of "They Shoot Horses, Don't They?"). They play a peripheral part in the conflict. Lance and Holloway both want to wed Cathy. Clearly, Cathy prefers Lance. Meantime, Colonel Drum refuses to let Lance escort Tucsos to Fort Grant. Instead, Drum orders Lance to send Holloway in his place, shocking everybody. Lance has never changed an order. Furthermore, Lance saw Cathy and Holloway kissing in public. Everybody thinks Lance has reassigned Holloway out of sheer jealousy. Indeed, one officer observes that rewriting orders is about as sacrilegious as rewriting the Bible. Predictably, Tucsos escapes, and the surviving troopers accompanied by Harmony bring back  Holloway’s mutilated body.

Although Drum anticipates the arrival of a relief column of 400 troopers in ten days, Harmony explains Tucsos will launch an attack before they arrive. Since Tucsos was held captive in the fort, the wily Apache knows about the shortage of manpower. Lance wants to take six or seven men of his choosing to maintain Fort Invincible and thwart Tucsos from assembling a war party. A defile in the mountain pass keeps the Indians from riding through in full strength. Instead, they must pass through one-at-a-time. Lance believes his men can hold Invincible until the relief column shows up. Drum gives him permission, and Lance recruits the worst men. All of them hate him with a passion and crave the chance to kill him.

"Only the Valiant" exemplifies the new breed of military western emerging after World War II. This is not a gung-ho John Ford cavalry western with troopers serenading their commanders. Again, Lance's own men want to kill him. This foreshadows the attitude of troops during the Vietnam War when they fragged their officers. Lance bears the onus of Holloway’s death—except those few privy to the circumstances that prompted the change of orders sending Holloway in charge of the escort. The black & white photography enhances the grim nature of this western. "Only the Valiant" amounts to a last stand western until the last-minute reprieve. Reportedly, Peck hated this movie, but then it is not “The Gunfighter” with its anti-violence message. If anything, "Only the Valiant" lives up to its Warner Brothers origins. Small but significant, it bristles with melodramatic twists and turns and features lots of unsavory characters, virtually a "Dirty Dozen" western.