Cathardincu Surprisingly incoherent and boring

FeistyUpper If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

Rio Hayward All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

Suman Roberson It's a movie as timely as it is provocative and amazingly, for much of its running time, it is weirdly funny.

Wuchak Released in 1948 and directed by John Ford, "Fort Apache" stars John Wayne as a veteran war captain who is challenged when Fort Apache is placed under the command of a naïve, glory hungry lieutenant colonel (Henry Fonda) who doesn't understand nor respect the local Natives. Shirley Temple plays the daughter of the new commander who becomes romantically interested in one of the officers (John Agar).How do you review an old Western like this when you can't stand B&W or old-fashioned scores and hokey antiquated songs, not to mention the incongruent campy elements and slapstick (non)humor Ford is known for? Basically you have to ignore all these factors and focus on the story and the actors. If you can do this, "Fort Apache" is worth checking out. Wayne was lean & mean at almost 41 (during shooting) and Temple was a seriously winsome cutie at almost 20. Amazingly, the film utilizes real Native Americans for the cast and the movie gets extra points for this and their respected portrayal. The film runs 128 minutes and was shot in Utah (e.g. Monument Valley & Arches), Arizona and California. The screenplay was written by Frank S. Nugent from a story by James Warner Bellah. GRADE: B-

paulccarroll3 Spielberg,Scorcese,and other Directors have said that John Ford is the greatest American director. Ford was a tough, often bullying director,who didn't like to talk about the underlying themes of His films. He was,however,a romantic and progressive storyteller. For romance look to films like "How Green Was My Valley","The Quiet Man",or "3 Godfathers". As a progressive,look at how in several different Westerns He portrays Native Americans as fighting to preserve their land,and way of life, while showing many white characters as ignorant and racist.After John Wayne was so good in Howard Hawks' "Red River",Ford said "I Didn't know He could really act!",and yet He repeatedly used Wayne as the lead in His films.This is probably an example of Ford running down an actor, to keep them from getting a high opinion of themselves. In "Fort Apache", however,Wayne is relegated to virtually a supporting role, as this is obliviously Henry Fondas' film,with a character that is so antithetical to His normal,likable,relateable,everyman persona.(See "My Darling Clementine","The Grapes of Wrath",or "Twelve Angry Men"etc.) But though His character is pompous and glory hungry,He's interesting, and you keep hoping that He might see the error of his ways before it's too late. But Ford didn't want a unbelievable reverse in the character's personality,just to have a happy ending. Instead, He let Lieutenant Colonel Thursdays' shortcomings run it's course,and let Him lead his command to ruin and massacre. All the better to show how our heroes are often a flimsy facade. You'd like to slap Thursday,but you can't stop watching. The two other films in Fords' Cavalry trilogy might be more fun, but they aren't as meaningful,or any better done.

Edgar Allan Pooh . . . as in Robert Heinlein's STARSHIP TROOPERS, director John Ford's final upbeat paean to "victory" might be possible to swallow. Or if they'd just had Multiplex theaters in Monument Valley when FORT APACHE premiered, Mr. Ford's racist groveling at the Altar of Manifest Destiny might have been nipped in the bud before he churned out a half dozen more of these malicious horse operas there. Given that German film director Leni Riefenstahl deserves a rating of "10" for her movie entitled TRIUMPH OF THE WILL (when translated into English, which details Hitler's rise to power), a person can spare an "8" for Mr. Ford's strikingly-photographed (not unlike an Ansel Adams work) homage here to an American Mini-Hitler (obviously Henry Fonda's "Col. Thursday" is based upon the hatchet job that Republicans have done over the years on their assassinated Whistleblower, George Armstrong Custer, whose ACTUAL championing of Native Americans is wonderfully portrayed by Errol Flynn in THEY DIED WITH THEIR BOOTS ON). In FORT APACHE, Mr. Ford wastes our first 90 minutes detailing an affair between an Irish cavalry trooper (acted out by an undistinguished newbie) and a stymied tap-dancing tea-totaler (who'll only drink Shirley Temples). Sounds like a match made in Hell!

Scott44 I agree with cstotlar-1 (Uncomfortable Mismatch, cstotlar-1, 19 June 2012) and ccthemovieman-1 (Not Deserving Of The High Marks It Gets, ccthemovieman-1, 13 March 2007) that Fort Apache is disappointing. I disagree with James Hitchcock (Fine, if dated, drama of men at war, James Hitchcock from Tunbridge Wells, England, 24 July 2010) that it portrays the Indians sympathetically. There's a substantial amount of racism present here, as with other Ford films (most notably the Searchers).The story depicts the soldiers at Fort Apache very favorably. As with almost every other war film ever made, Ford fills his company with his familiar group of players with everyone at least in their mid-40s (including some at grandfather age). You don't see many young men, the kind that actually die in real wars. The age of Ford's regiment reduces the tension we might feel with younger cast members.There are many camera-mugging scenes that are rather painful to watch. For example, Ford seems terribly impressed with Victor McLaglen's comedic skills, but McLaglen never delivers. The scene with the new recruits is particularly bad.Henry Fonda's Lt. Col. Owen Thursday repeatedly behaves unexpectedly, such as when he orders John Wayne's Capt. Kirby York to the rear to escape the oncoming battle. In real life, Thursday would order his rival to the front lines while he himself stayed back. That's how military commanders have done it as long as they have existed.Still, Fonda and Wayne are both good enough, saving Fort Apache. Fonda is playing against type as a glory-hunting racist. His rejection of the man his daughter (implausibly named Philadelphia Thursday) loves is another nonsensical plot turn, particularly since Lt. Michael O'Rourke is a war-hero who went to West Point. He should be at the top of Thursday's social pecking order, not below it.The scenes with Wayne meeting up with Cochise and the Indians are well done. The Indians are rendered sympathetically at this time. However, when we see them calmly massacring the cavalry charge the sympathy is erased.The battle scenes are interesting if you can tolerate many horses being made to fall to the ground. About the best quality of the battle scenes are the apparent speed with which the horses are galloping.Fort Apache is for people who like watching white, middle-aged soldiers depicted heroically; or for watching John Ford's stock company mugging for the camera. Ford, Wayne and Fonda have all been better elsewhere. Fort Apache doesn't inspire multiple viewings.