Ulzana's Raid

Rating:
Summary: An overlooked, but very realistic western.
Review: This US Cavalry vs. the Apaches movie had the misfortune of being released not too long after "Little Big Man" had thoroughly demolished the image of the heroic frontier soldier. Audiences were no longer interested in seeing the cavalry as protagonists, and this film sunk into obscurity.

It's shame because this is a terrific gem of a movie, and arguably the most realistic film depiction of the Indian wars. On the surface it appears to be a standard cavalry vs. Indians film: a green lieutenant is tasked with the job of hunting down a band of renegade Apaches with the help of a grizzled frontier scout. Yet, the plot is the only standard thing about "Ulzana's Raid." Neither the cavalry or the Apaches are portrayed as stainless heroes: men are tortured to death, women brutalized, and the dead mutilated. The ugliness of the Indian wars is depicted with candor.

Also depicted is the hopelessness of it. "Ulzana's Raid" shows that the real tough job for the cavalry was not fighting the Indians, it was finding them. How could they find a small body of men in a wilderness who moved faster and knew the lay the land far better than they did? The cavalry just had to follow in the wake of raiding party's destruction, and hope the Indians would make a mistake which would allow them to narrow the gap. It was not glamorous or adventurous, but it certainly was frustrating and dehumanizing. "Ulzana's Raid" depicts all of this. Thus was the life of the US Cavalry on the frontier, it's a long way from John Ford's sabre-carrying, troopers charging to the rescue.

Rating:
Summary: one of lancaster's finest
Review: Ulzana's Raid ranks with Go Tell The Spartans as two of Lancaster's finest performances. In each, he portrays a war weary soldier/scout in what he understands as an unwinnable conflict. Ulzana's Raid is somehow able to describe the hidious nature of the wars against the Apache without losing track what motivates each side. Like all good films, there is substantial character evolution and understanding. As Lancaster says when asked why he doesn't hate the apaches, "you might as well hate the desert for being dry". I only wish Ulzana's Raid will be released in wide screen DVD. It deserves better than having one third of the image deleted.

Rating:
Summary: Culture clash - A lesson from History.
Review: Viewing this film should be part of any university degree's Social History and/or Western History curriculum.

With the Spaghetti Western in the ascendent (late '60s, early '70s), Hollywood took to re-evaluating its view of the American Indian. Hitherto, the Indians were depicted as irrascible and villainous savages prone to hideous extremes of violence and cruelty - fully deserving of confinement to reservations or outright extermination.

This re-evaluation of American/colonists' mores in the Old West came at a time during the 1960s when violence as an 'entertainment concept' was also subject to re-evaluation: the nightly news footage and 'body counts' of the Vietnam Conflict had made the punch of the fist and the gunshot - formerly the stock-in-trade of the good ol' cowboy - seem both tame and outmoded next to napalm and helicopter gunships. The foreign policy of the United States had always been portrayed as morally just. But Vietnam made the American public wonder if their crusaders really were on the side of the angels - particularly when details of Lt. Calley's massacre of My-Lai became known. The bubble burst as violence inside America itself erupted from the television screens during the Anderson-Watts riots in Los Angeles (1965), the brutality of the Chicago police at the Democratic Party Convention (1968), and the apparently trigger-happy 'eagerness' of the Ohio National Guard during the Kent State University demonstrations (4th May, 1970) in which four white, middle-class students were shot dead and ten others badly wounded.

Seen as Robert Aldrich's 'comment' on America's involvement in Vietnam, Ulzana's Raid was one of those coming-of-age Westerns that depicted the brutality of a violent culture clash, but without judging its morality - or lack of it - as neither side is portrayed as either better or worse than the other, just different. Similar films were Soldier Blue (1970) and Chato's Land (1971).

Word arrives that Chiricahua warrior Ulzana has jumped the San Carlos reservation with a band of followers. The local Company Captain of the resident 6th Cavalry Regiment has misgivings about pursuing an Apache with a reputation such as Ulzana's, and devolves command - and thus responsibility should it fail - upon young and recently arrived from West Point Lieutenant DeBuin (Bruce Davison). Young DeBuin, son of a Baptist minister, is advised in the field by wily veteran scout McIntosh (Burt Lancaster).

It is a steep learning curve, but DeBuin can also draw upon first-hand observations and knowledge by asking direct questions to Chiricahua scout Ke-na-tay (Jorge Luke), Ulzana's brother-in-law. To the young idealist's credit, his ingrained White Man's contempt of Redskins is superseded by the command's experience - mirroring Major Dundee with its repetitive phrase "until the Apache is apprehended or killed" - as DeBuin learns both how the Apache live by such apparently barbarous standards in the harsh lands of the 'Apacheria' (the American south-west, where the various bands of Apache have/had their homelands), and that their acts of deliberate cruelty are often a cunning tactical manoeuvre, designed to play upon their adversaries' weaknesses and cultural foibles ... successfully and effectively, too.

Particularly unsettling is the scene in which the tactically gang-raped Mrs. Riordon staggers into the pond and attempts to clean herself - a scene often cut from TV versions. The soldiers remain seated, unconcerned ... after all, McIntosh had summed-up earlier, "It ain't nice cleanin' up after Apaches ..."

HISTORICAL NOTE: There really was an Ul-sannah (also spelled Jolsanny) who often jumped the reservation with Geronimo. In 1885 he led his own successful - or notorious, if one is White - raiding party consisting of himself and nine men. There was also an Archie McIntosh, a devoted scout for General Crook of some twenty years' standing. He was fired from his assigned task of rationing officer following accusations - unfortunately substantiated - of stealing supplies for his own use.

MY ONLY GRIPE: am not aware any horses were harmed in the making of this film, but my DVD copy has the shot horses-staggering-to-the-ground scenes omitted. It makes for VERY stilted viewing to see a shooter aiming ... firing ... and the rider rolling on the ground AFTERWARDS. This DVD version is not a Director's Cut ...