Rio Grande

In a lot of ways, this is a really weird movie, and that’s even considering that it is a western from the olden days (1950) and reflects a philosophy and mores that are ever more alien to today’s society. The plot, such as it is, does a lot of meandering to ultimately make its point, which is ... well, that’s hard to pin down. A conflict with Apaches serves as the milieu for what is actually a family story of estrangement and internal conflict. That’s a clear through line of the film, though it sometimes gets lost in various and sundry other bits of rather superfluous subplots and story aspects. A B-story about a soldier on the lam trying to avoid prosecution for a crime works its way into the story, without being particularly interesting or necessary to driving the main storyline. That soldier is portrayed as a former rebel, a piece of the movie’s overarching element—I’m not sure it qualifies as a theme—that suggests that the U.S. army in the Indian wars days was loaded with unreconstructed Confederates, which would explain a lot. (One might surmise that that continues to be the case down to the present day—and, again, that explains a lot.) And speaking of loaded, Victor McLaglen does yeoman's work as a relentlessly boozing Irish sergeant, a character that might draw some viewer ire in a film made today. Ultimately, the film pays off its efforts at trying the audience’s patience with a typical climactic shoot-'em-up set piece. I guess it’s not a bad movie, but when John Ford and John Wayne are involved, you expect something a bit more impressive. The cavalry does arrive, eventually, but maybe not in time to save this movie’s day.