John Ford's Masterpiece of the Frontier!
Owen Thursday sees his new posting to the desolate Fort Apache as a chance to claim the military honour which he believes is rightfully his. Arrogant, obsessed with military form and ultimately self-destructive, he attempts to destroy the Apache chief Cochise after luring him across the border from Mexico, against the advice of his subordinates.
- Bleak ending
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Character
Classical in form, meticulous, grave and earnest.
- classical in formformally daring
- rawmeticulous
- gravecomic
- earnestironic
- intimateepic
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“Does it romanticize the West?”
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“Is this John Ford's best work?”
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“Is John Wayne the best thing in Fort Apache?”
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Reviews on TMDB
Written by TMDB members; each links to the original. Not part of Tastebuds's numbers.
- CinemaSerfon TMDB · Jul 20227/10
Certainly, I think, the best of the John Ford US cavalry trilogies this one. Henry Fonda is cracking as the honourable, but out of his depth, by-the-book colonel sent to run a ramshackle army post just as the Apache are on the rise again. He replaces the far more practically experienced John Wayne and soon it all gets a bit sticky. John Agar and Shirley Temple provide an amiable romantic sub-plot as the very green lieutenant son of the Sergeant Major (Ward Bond) and the daughter of the Colonel who fall in love - despite the disapproval of (for different reasons) both sets of parents. The photography is, as usual, quite stunning - George O'Brien; Pedro Armedáris, Dick Foran and the inimitable Victor McLaglen all contribute hugely (and frequently humorously) to a tight little, and occasionally quite thought-provoking, Frank Nugent screenplay and the Admiral maintains a decent degree of jeopardy - between the two, on-form, leads and between them and the Apache - until the very, gallant, end. It's held up remarkably well, nodding subtly - but distinctly - to the appalling way the native American tribes were treated during the pioneering, expansion of the United States.
Read the whole review on TMDB - John Chardon TMDB · May 20199/10
Any questions? Fort Apache is the first film of what came to be known as John Ford's US Cavalry trilogy. Just like the other two, She Wore A Yellow Ribbon & Rio Grande, this is also based on a short story by James Warner Bellah. Originally intended to be shot in colour, it was however filmed in black and white with Ford still making spectacular use of the Monument Valley location. The story primarily deals with opposite factions within the same army. On one hand is Lt. Col. Owen Thursday (Henry Fonda), stiffly rigid in his beliefs, a stickler for the rules and pig ignorant and hostile towards the Indians he has been sent to control. On the other hand is Captain. Kirby York (John Wayne), more relaxed towards those under his command, he's also knowledgeable about, and respectful towards, the Indian race. Thursday is also something of a chauvinist and a snob, he is determined to stop a burgeoning union between his daughter Philadelphia (Shirley Temple) and Lieutenant O'Rourke (John Agar), with O'Rourke's homely family seen as too low for his daughter. All of this is played out in a far out military outpost, something else that Thursday also resents - that he was sent here instead of s
Read the whole review on TMDB
Cast
- John WayneCapt. Kirby York
- Henry FondaLt. Col. Owen Thursday
- Shirley TemplePhiladelphia Thursday
- Pedro ArmendárizSgt. Beaufort
- Ward BondSgt. Maj. Michael O'Rourke
- George O'BrienCapt. Sam Collingwood
- Victor McLaglenSgt. Festus Mulcahy
- Anna LeeMrs. Emily Collingwood
- Irene RichMrs. Mary O'Rourke
- Dick ForanSgt. Quincannon
Crew
- John FordDirector
- Frank S. NugentScreenplay
- Archie StoutDirector of Photography
- Richard HagemanOriginal Music Composer
- Jack MurrayEditor
- Merian C. CooperProducer
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Pairings
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