Solemplex To me, this movie is perfection.

Mjeteconer Just perfect...

MusicChat It's complicated... I really like the directing, acting and writing but, there are issues with the way it's shot that I just can't deny. As much as I love the storytelling and the fantastic performance but, there are also certain scenes that didn't need to exist.

FirstWitch A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

weezeralfalfa Glen Ford, as Texan settler John Stroud, finds himself threatened with death by 3 opposing groups during the fight for Texas independence from Mexico, his only apparent friend an orphan Mexican boy: the only survivor of a raid by American renegades dressed as Mexicans, who killed Stroud's family and burned his house. Stroud was one of the American defenders holed up inside the crumbling Alamo mission, being used as a fort, until he drew the black bean, used to decide who would try to ride through the Mexican lines to lead the families around his farm in a retreat. But he discovered that the renegades had already destroyed everything before he got there. The Mexican boy decides to 'adopt' Stroud as his new father, but when they go to town, the people figure out that he is the man who quit the Alamo, thus he is labeled a notorious coward. His association with the boy further suggests to them a pro-Mexican stance.The screenplay is very tightly constructed, and includes a complex web of ironies, which is one of the main selling point of the film. For example, the renegades unwittingly saved Stroud's life twice 1) the report of their proximity to some settlements caused Stroud to leave the Alamo, thus saving his life 2) Later, the renegades save Stroud from an imminent lynching by the enraged town people. This was an incidental result of their attack on the town, with the goal of robbing the bank and freeing one of their members from jail. Stroud professes his desire to join them, but they don't really trust him. Thus, he engages in several fist fights with them, the last leaving him presumably dead after tumbling down a long rocky slope. But , he is found by searching members of the fleeing townies plus cavalry protectors, and after recovering, he organizes the defense of the seemingly defenseless townies, minus their men, after the cavalry unit receives orders to immediately join Houston at San Jacinto. The women, kids, old men, and Stroud manage to annihilate the renegades, using borrowed cavalry firearms. Thus, Stroud achieves his revenge and resurrects his reputation as a brave and smart man.Chill Wills and the other townies, along with Hugh O'Brian, as commander of the cavalry unit, want to lynch Stroud when he refuses to vacate the region. Ironically, Wills is later pressured by Beth(Julie Adams) into doctoring the unconscious Stroud, after his long tumble, against an overriding sentiment to let Stroud die. Again, ironically, O'Brian's troops soon thereafter are called to abandon the wagon train and join Houston. Initially, O'Brian refuses to obey, but Stroud convinces him that he can lead an effective defense of the wagon train. Thus, the man they wanted to kill a short time before becomes their savior. Stroud effectively rescued the Mexican boy from starvation. but the association of the boy with Stroud increases the perception of Stroud as pro-Mexican, thus increasing the call to lynch him. The boy tries to tell the others why Stroud really left the Alamo, which Stroud inexplicably refuses to do. But, initially, he is disbelieved. Later, the boy saves Stroud's life by leading a search for him after he tumbled down that hill, and insisting that Wills try to revive Stroud. Also, he corroborates Stroud's statement why he left the Alamo, thus diffusing a renewed demand by the fleeing townies to kill Stroud. At the end, the implication is that Stroud, the boy, and Beth will form a new family.The biggest weakness of the screenplay is the extreme reaction of some of the Alamo defenders and of the townspeople to Stroud's leaving the Alamo, and his curious refusal to adequately explain why he did so, until late in the film. Also, Stroud recovered awfully quickly from his long tumble down that hill, and his being found by the boy is unlikely.Ford's character is very loosely based on the disputed historical fact or legend that one man(Moses Rose) chose to leave the Alamo, when given a choice. He said he saw no reason to stay and die in a hopeless defense. Thus, he was labeled a coward. Unlike the portrayal of Houston's attitude toward defending the Alamo, the historic Houston sent Bowie with instructions to remove the cannon and destroy the make-shift fort, as being indefensible! While at the Alamo, Stroud risks his life to reraise the Texas flag on the wall, while under cannon bombardment. The scenes of Mexican cannon bombardment are pretty cheesy.Only some of the firearms are the historically-relevant flint locks. The use of repeating firearms speeds up the gunplay for the audience. Yes, the women reloaded their muskets impossibly fast! Also, an obvious photocopy of President Hayes(1876-80) should have been removed from the jail wall!Several of the renegade actors took impressive body-slamming falls when shot off their horse or their horse was shot. Also, Victor Jory, as the head renegade: Jess Wade, takes quite a plunge down a waterfall. I don't see how this could have been faked. The assumption is that Wade drowned. However, it looks survivable to me, assuming a deep plunge pool.Presently, part of the Classic Western round-up, Vol. 2, DVD set, along with "The Texans", "California" and "The Cimarron Kid"

mark.waltz Glenn Ford has been put in jail for desertion over the fight at the Alamo, and nobody believes that he actually left his post for honorable reasons. When the town that has turned its back on him shows up to lynch him, he is briefly lucky when an American bandit (pretending to be Mexican) shows up and abducts him, falsely believing that Ford is on their side. In reality, the villain (Victor Jory) was responsible for Ford's family's deaths, and Ford is determined to expose the truth that Jory is out to rob the wagon train that these settlers are now in to get to California.The beautiful Julia Adams ("The Creature From the Black Lagoon", the TV soap "Capitol") is a feisty heroine who may look fragile but isn't above loading and using a rifle to keep the bandits away from her group which includes an obvious Caucasian kid (Mark Cavell) playing a Mexican whose family worked for Ford's. Daytime soap diva Jeanne Cooper may be hard to spot for those expecting to find "The Young and the Restless's" Katherine Chancellor, but once you do, you'll be delightfully surprised. Chill Wills, as a one-armed member of the wagon train, seems to have taken over here the roles that Walter Brennan was playing just a decade before.Overall, this is a fast-moving, colorful western, no classic or historically accurate, but fun and filled with action. Ford proves again he was one of the more versatile actors in Hollywood with his ability to go from comedy to romantic lead to film noir hero to action star.

Robert J. Maxwell Travis, Crockett, Bowie and the rest are back behind the barricades at the Alamo in 1836. Budd Boetticher directed this tale of Glen Ford, the only escapee and survivor. Of course, Glen Ford would not have left except that he and a dozen other heroic defenders had families and ranches up there around Oxbow and they drew lots (actually beans) to select the single one of them to leave the Alamo and see that those families thrive.So when Travis draws his famous line in the sand and says, "All of you who are with me, step across this line," only Glen Ford hangs silently back. Travis arranges Ford's escape and the others, who don't know beans about the lottery, sneer at him and call him a coward.Well, it didn't do the families of Ford or any of the others any good. It seems there are a gang of traitorous Texans who have been promised land grants by Santa Ana after the war. The gang is led by the ever-villainous Victor Jory as "Jess Wade" -- a name to conjure with -- and the ineffably viperous Neville Brand. They have murdered all the families and burned all the ranchitos. This fills Ford with rage.Ford rides into town to warn the residents of the approach of Santa Ana's troops but Hugh O'Brien's soldiers are already there, and O'Brien knows about Ford's leaving the Alamo.Complications follow, involving multiple shoot outs, a Mexican kid devoted to Ford, the pursuit of the town's wagon train by the gang, the slow melting of O'Brien's hatred towards Ford, the gathering warmth of Julia Adams' schoolmarm, the destruction of Jory's gang, and the redemption of Ford.This is a thought-provoking movie. So, okay. Everyone considers Ford a coward and deserter because he fled under fire. The only men who knew the reason for it are dead. When townsmen, soldiers, women, and children spit on him and get ready to lynch him -- why doesn't he EXPLAIN why he left? That's the principal thought the film provokes.But of course Glen is not the kind of man who talks excessively or "feels sorry for himself" or tries to excuse any of his actions. Here's another example of what I mean. He's in the midst of a shoot out with Victor Jory atop a mountain. The footpath gives way under his boot and he seems to roll down the slope for several thousand yards before sprawling, apparently dead, in the scree. Jory smiles down at the body way below and doesn't even bother to shoot him.The unconscious Ford is about to die but is rescued by the little Mexican kid and Julia Adams. They manage to pull him through after a day or so. Ford regains consciousness and begins to climb to his feet. No, no, say his two saviors, wait until you regain your strength. "A man's gotta get up sometime. Why not now?" You don't seriously expect this guy to EXPLAIN himself, do you? Now, I am not an historian or a gun freak, but my impression is that this movie does to historical accuracy what a bulldozer does to asphalt. The Old West (roughly 1865 to 1895) depicted in movies can be divided into three tiers. (1) Absolute disregard for accuracy, as when John Wayne gallops his horse along a road lined with telegraph poles. (2) The Movie West, in which wardrobe and plot conventions are as taken for granted as our most primitive beliefs. (3) The "Realistic" West, in which somebody has done some research and spent some money on period props. This one purports to belong to the third tier but yearns with all its soul to leap down to the second tier and finally, unlike the defenders of the Alamo, surrenders willingly.The Battle of the Alamo took place in 1836, not during the conventional period. And there are some nods to period accuracy -- soldiers wear the hats of sea captains, one carries a saber, there are a sprinkling of buckskin shirts, the ersatz Mexicans wear embroidered jackets, and the hat brims are sometimes wider than usual though not always.But that's it. The rifles and muskets are muzzle loading, as they should be, but they're shorter than usual so they don't get in the way of the action. And for only one brief moment do we see one being loaded the gals in the bonnets. Too much exposure to the inexpert use of balls, ramrods, powder horns and the like would slow the tempo from agitato to moderato. The pistols aren't flintlocks but the Colt and Remington six shooters common to all Westerns. At one point, Glen Ford fans his pistol and gets off a quick series of blasts. They're carried in conventional gun belts and holsters, not clipped to belts or stuck through them. The men wear ordinary shirts with string ties and vests. The tight bodices and wide skirts of the women are generic and ex post filmo. They all seem checkered and loud. They might have been seen at a Nebraska picnic in 1920. I don't mean to suggest that this detracts in any way from Julia Adam's recherché appeal, any more than does the concave profile of her nose, which seems to begin in the middle of her forehead.If there's a lot of stereotypy in the plot, is it at least well executed, helped by the dialog? No. Boetticher needed the poetic Burt Kennedy as a writer, and the marmoreal Randolph Scott as the lead.It's okay if there's nothing better to do or if you want to be wafted away into a world as remote from the real as Oz.

alexandre michel liberman (tmwest) Glenn Ford is fighting at the Alamo and he is chosen among friends to go out and save their families. Hugh O'Brian also has to leave on an official mission. Just after Ford leaves, the Alamo falls, and he is branded a coward, especially by O'Brian, who does not know the real reason Ford left. Very good story,about the individual standing up against a collective prejudice, co-written by Niven Busch (Duel in the Sun, Pursued, The Westerner) and directed by Budd Boetticher, who in later years directed many westerns with Randolph Scott. This film is full of action, very good music and scenery. Boetticher shows his special touch when there is a shootout with plenty of strategy involved.