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Reviews
Mustang Country (1976)
A strangely sad movie with wonderful scenery and a thin plot Mcrae was a giant and his days were over.
I had accidentally seen this movie at about the same time of the day--very early morning getting ready to run all day errands and dreading it.
I owned horses for many years and know when a man is riding and when he is just filling the saddle. McCrea used to RIDE and in a few scenes here he did it again.
My dad's entire male family broke horses for a living. Ironically that the money they earned made enough money for my dad to have the first student owned car at his high school in Nebraska.
He knew things about horses in his late seventies that it makes me wonder just how much he knew in his prime.
This movie takes me back to those days. Simplicity and horse people. Beauty, slow speed and with a simple plot it can't hurt to watch it.
When I saw how everyone in the movie had aged I thought about how good I look now look at age 62. Then I saw the year this film was made. 1976! I graduated High School and was in college at that time!!!.
I included the parts about myself because that is what this film brought up. IF you are a horse person--you will enjoy it. IF you are looking for the typical Western--you will be disappointed. This film brings back memories of Mcrae's skill as a movie star. He was still good. Pat Wayne and the Ken Doll-- Fuller were there taking up film. Sorry-- was never too fond of their work. WJ
Geronimo: An American Legend (1993)
Finally, It often takes an Indian to LOOK LIKE an Indian
This movie is enthralling. I have always enjoyed well-done narration during a movie and this narration done by Gatewood, was excellent. It was not filled with emotion and yet the emotion was there without being evident.
His voice is powerful and he reads extremely well. He also acts extremely well. The entire cast is equal to Hackman and THAT is an accomplishment.
I remember when I became addicted to his breakthrough movie Bonnie and Clyde. I loved the movie and I had NEVER seen acting like Hackman's. Though I loved what he did I also did not want him to walk away with the movie. HE didn't Warren Beaty and Faye did not let this happen nor did the man who played "CW" In Real life there was a character that went by his initials and the betrayal actually did take place I do not know why they changed the initials of the man whose father betrayed Bonnie and Clyde.
I did not mean to get off track and that movie is my favorite of all time.
The legend of Geronimo is absolutely in the top five movies of my life. It is so well done that you can HEAR the crack and moaning of the saddles and they are mounted and the arrows hit home. The acting is superb by all who played in this movie-- it seemed like a docu. but it was not.
IF you fail to watch this movie- you have missed out.
The saddest part is that Geronimo lives another 20 + years and dies of pnemonia from lying in a ditch about a mile from the bar where he got drunk. He just died on the side of the road. A man who sent a chill into each whiteman's heart and a rush into every warriors heart- died in a drainage ditch. They may have brought his dying body to the hospital and I believe he made piece and spiritually died in that ditch. Fitting for what happened to the Natives of this land called America.
I find it absurd that the settlers who came here from Europe were called Americans and the indigenous people who had been here long long before are called INdians--because of the stupidity of the settlers who seized what they wanted and called THEMSELVES Americans and called the spiritual people who did not suffer from much disease until the arrival of the Europeans-- Indians.
The Indians were the Americans. The people who slaughtered their food supply and simply out-numbered and used superior technology to displace them were European invaders and should have been called such. Geronimo would have been a great man to share a few drinks. Just to meet him would have been an experience of a life time. He was NOT a savage--not more than WE would be if some superior force began to creep across our great country that we stole from the Americans.
Warren E. Justice
The Alamo: Thirteen Days to Glory (1987)
This is just another camera on the Alamo with a bunch great actors. That formula just doesn't work! OK?
I have to give these guys a five just for doing this movie. I think it would be like doing "THE JAMES BOYS" again but they DID it and put their aging faces and their ragged bodies through another one.
No one EVER did a GOOD job on this subject. Every movie made about the Alamo fell on its face. John Wayne practically sold his sole (or maybe he finally did THAT at midnight one night ... But it still failed...Badly! This one was no different. They tried to take another picture of the moon to Earth and found it has already been done and we only wanted to see it ONCE!
There were moments of acting that burst out of every great actor in this movie like magical stars on the stage and then... there were moments that just stunk! IF I was an actor and I was offered a role in an "Alamo" movie I would quit and go into selling Tupperware door to door. Kieth was good, only a few days from losing it openly, he pulled it off and Arness even forced his long,heavy back to stay straight for 4 min at a time! You can't DO a movie about The Alamo unless The Alamo is just in the background.
And I give these men and women a round of applause. I would NEVER try this and they felt the same way but did it anyway!! YAY for
All of them!!! GUTS!!!!
Warren E. Justice ACRPS,CAS,CADAC, CIMS, I could go on and on.... But I would NEVER do the Alamo!!
Taza, Son of Cochise (1954)
Story that is VERY loosely based on Apache Life During Geronimo's time.
This movie is well-famed and Rock Hudson looked great ( as he always did even to non-gay men). The long hair and darkened skin make him an awesome looking Indian. His Features are White but this was more often the case in Hollywood movies about Indians than roles of Indians played by real Indians. It is Ironic that Taza's son became an actor and acted in early westerns.. I learned this fact by IMDb. I shall use it in my future writing.
No-- It took 45 yrs to force Geronimo to Surrender and his legend is founded largely on the fact that he was never caught but due to many of his own warriors becoming scouts, he was forced to surrender. It is sad but in a very harsh way--just punishment that these scouts were stripped of their roles as Scouts and sent to the same prison where Geronimo was. They served much longer sentences than what they were given. This is yet another unfairness done to the APACHE and to Geronimo. Who died in his mid-eighties from alcoholism and from falling from his horse on the way home from a saloon. HE wound up in a irrigation ditch all night and caught pneumonia as a result and died shortly after. Not a fitting end for a man that could raise the back of the hair on many a settler and many a cavalry soldier who had to think about his chances of surviving a battle with him.
He almost beat the US army--but alcoholism is a disease that killed far more Indians than cavalry soldiers ever did. The Native American had NO time in their history to develop a resistance to the effects of alcohol---both the immediate effects and the long-term effects shortened the lives of most Native Americans who drank it.
In the much later movie GERONIMO starring Gene Hackman and Robert Duvall, the camera takes us on the long train ride to Florida in the end of the movie. Some Apaches who did not become traitors to Geronimo were being chastised by loyal warriors and Geronimo reminds them that they are so few that it would be good for them to learn to get a long- -he reminds them that all they have is each other.
Geronimo was a name that leaps off of the pages even now--- but in his lifetime-- anything written about him was read immediately because it was usually news about his ongoing exploits. It is very sad that they allow the mistake of saying that he was captured to be stated as truth among his own people. Because the fact that he was not captured or killed even though the forces used to find and arrest or kill him were massive, is a testimonial to the skill of the Apache and to Geronimo himself. I believe the final number that surrendered was under 100. However, I would not want to be a settler and live anywhere Near where that 100 Apache were running free. They were intelligent, skilled warriors and Geronimo has been called a tactical genius. Since he was NEVER captured-- that must be true.
I must clarify: I do not believe that Geronimo Was EVER actually Captured-- He did surrender twice and after the second surrender, he was sent to prison in Florida. He was treated with respect by white soldiers with high level rank and other Apache though that respect from White Generals did deteriorate, he was NEVER just dismissed by his peers. This movie shows that happening again and again. This is tragic for the Apache was never really conquered and to say that he was, cheats him of the truth. Entire Armies were sent against them but they were NOT actually beaten in the common sense of the word. IF I was an Apache-- I would want that fact to remain clear and would be angered by a sloppy screenplay from Hollywood that disputes the truth of the Apache's wartime accomplishments. They have never been equalled.
Warren E.Justice
McLintock! (1963)
John Wayne has been put down as always "just playing himself" I love to hear people say that-- I answer with a few thoughts of my own.
I hear people who simply don't get it with The Duke that he "just plays himself" If I have a chance I ask--- Then John Wayne is a gunfighter, Texas Ranger, Excellent fighter, War Hero, Expert Brawler, Indian Scout, Super horseman ( he just may be! He sits a horse better than I can and I tried to copy his style for years on a horse. This after breaking five horses myself but I just could not get the look or the feel of the horse the way it looks like he has ... My dad who was a true-life Horse Whisperer said that "a man who can sit a horse like John Wayne knows em, and has spent hundreds of hours on em and has finally just given into riding a horse naturally-- He just rides em and forgets that is what he is doing"
So John is a superhero? IF his acting is being himself then he truly is exactly what EVERY true man wants to be and should have received even more acclaim than what he did. He was a HUGE help to the war effort even though he never really was a soldier. He was a hero to Native Americans before it was cool to be good to them and he was a man who believed in hard work and was against welfare and a PC world GOOD... Then John Wayne Truly was one of the best actors of all time. Even better than what I rated him before I started taking your view- - he just plays himself!!!..... Welll...... Thanks John. You changed my life when you were alive and you changed it as you passed away-- now you have changed it again LONG after your death. You were my biggest HERO. I love you. I wish you would have taken better care of yourself. I miss you. What I would not give to have a new John Wayne Movie to watch. I wonder what Rhonda Fleming would have been like with him? FIRE?
Warren E. Justice