![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/Fort-apache-4.jpg\" "\\"Fort-apache\\"")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
I<\/span>t took me several years to get around to the first part of John Ford’s informal Cavalry Trilogy, and I’m not sure why, unless it’s simply that both of the other entries (1949’s She Wore a Yellow Ribbon<\/em> and 1950’s Rio Grande<\/em>) both fell into the “liked okay” territory for me, so I wasn’t hugely excited about tracking down Fort Apache<\/em> despite the added bonus of Henry Fonda and the added curiosity of a teenage Shirley Temple.<\/p>\n I definitely should’ve sought it out sooner, though. This is easily the strongest of the three films, and continues the excellent streak of westerns I’ve been watching lately. Fonda plays a by-the-book cavalry officer sent to oversee a fort on the western frontier who comes into conflict with the men already stationed there over dress code, etiquette, and Indian fighting techniques – oh, and the little matter of one of the young soldiers wanting to date his daughter.<\/p>\n In a way, it’s kind of like the WWI stories I enjoy so much, which basically show the demise of an old way of fighting in the face of a new one. Here, Fonda’s straight-laced sense of military honor is simply not matched to the Indian’s guerilla tactics or the rough exterior required to survive on the frontier. He’s contrasted with his second-in-command John Wayne, who is a seasoned frontier soldier and both knows and respects the Indians. Throughout most of the film, it’s really frustrating to watch Fonda, because he’s pretty pig-headed in the face of advice from Wayne and the other men. He makes some pretty terrible decisions, especially a major one toward the end that flouts the goodwill Wayne had worked to build with an exiled Indian chief.<\/p>\n I should’ve expected this from a Ford film, but both the plotting and character work here is really great, and as easy as it is to be against Fonda, his final scenes are tragic – the tragedy of a man who simply couldn’t break free of his preconceptions and wasn’t ready for the new world of the frontier. Back to my WWI comparison, it’s not unlike the sense of tragedy we feel for Erich von Stroheim and his class in Grand Illusion<\/em>, despite that character supervising a German POW camp. It’s a false nobility these characters have, to be sure, yet there is still nobility there as they watch the world they knew disintegrate before their eyes.<\/p>\n Fort Apache<\/em> of course works as an adventure film as well, with Monument Valley shown in all its glory, and a dangerous illicit trip to Mexico as a nice little stealth centerpiece before the all-out battle of the end. I’m not a huge fan of Shirley Temple as a “grown-up” (she’s about 16 or 17 here); she can’t quite shed the cutesy little girl persona. But the fort home life scenes here do their job nicely, providing a contrast to the military action of the main plot and a very immediate sense of what the men are risking. The military setting gives the film a different feel than a lot of westerns, which I didn’t care for as much in Ford’s other two cavalry films, but it works quite well here.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It took me several years to get around to the first part of John Ford’s informal Cavalry Trilogy, and I’m not sure why, unless it’s simply that both of the other entries (1949’s She Wore a Yellow Ribbon and 1950’s Rio Grande) both fell into the “liked okay” territory for me, so I wasn’t hugely […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":32884,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[1340,2234,1474,2822,2823],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/fort-apache-feat.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":32879,"url":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/2013\/10\/scorecard-june-september-2013\/","url_meta":{"origin":32823,"position":0},"title":"Scorecard: June-September 2013","author":"Jandy","date":"October 1, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"This has been a long time in the works. Even after I decided to just go with picture instead of blurbs and the whole bit, it still took me like two weeks to put together. Lots of interruptions lately. The baby is crawling, and she has the best cord-finding radar\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Film"","block_context":{"text":"Film","link":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/category\/film\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/SC-Much-Ado-About-Nothing.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":35863,"url":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/2016\/05\/challenge-week-18-fail-safe\/","url_meta":{"origin":32823,"position":1},"title":"Challenge Week 18: Fail-Safe","author":"Jandy","date":"May 9, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"If Ken's other film Mortal Kombat had me a bit apprehensive going into it, I was pretty excited about this one - a political thriller based on the same book as Dr. Strangelove (and released the same year), but with a totally straight rather than satirical take on it. It's\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "2016 Movie Challenge"","block_context":{"text":"2016 Movie Challenge","link":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/category\/film\/2016-movie-challenge\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/tf-feat1.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":3333,"url":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/2010\/03\/easy-riders-they-shoot-horses-dont-they\/","url_meta":{"origin":32823,"position":2},"title":"Easy Riders…: They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?","author":"Jandy","date":"March 10, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"[Rating:4\/5] This film should come with a warning label: \"Do not watch if you are already in a suicidal state.\" Seriously, I've seen some downer movies in my time, but as far as gutwrenching, exhausting, draining, and depressing movies go, this has to be up near the top of the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Film"","block_context":{"text":"Film","link":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/category\/film\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"theyshoothorses01.jpg","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/03\/theyshoothorses01.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":35078,"url":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/2015\/03\/previewing-the-2015-tcm-classic-film-fest\/","url_meta":{"origin":32823,"position":3},"title":"Previewing the 2015 TCM Classic Film Fest","author":"Jandy","date":"March 23, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"The Sixth Annual TCM Classic Film Festival is nearly upon us - four glorious days of immersion in classic film in the heart of Hollywood along with hundreds of our fellow classic film fans. It's the best time of the year for those of us who love Hollywood's golden era\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "TCM Film Festival"","block_context":{"text":"TCM Film Festival","link":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/category\/film\/tcm-film-festival\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/03\/TCM-Film-Festival-2015.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":27205,"url":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/2011\/09\/scorecard-august-2011\/","url_meta":{"origin":32823,"position":4},"title":"Scorecard: August 2011","author":"Jandy","date":"September 15, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"A long time ago I used to do a monthly round-up of films I saw during the month. I stopped doing it when I started writing for Row Three, but I don't really have time to write up full reviews for everything over there. Some capsules go into our joint\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Film"","block_context":{"text":"Film","link":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/category\/film\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/AttacktheBlock.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":23514,"url":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/2011\/06\/dvd-triage-week-of-june-21\/","url_meta":{"origin":32823,"position":5},"title":"DVD Triage: Week of June 21","author":"Jandy","date":"June 21, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Another kind of lackluster week, though there are a few solid releases in here. The Instant Watch selection is particularly slim, but there's a good chunk of films slated for the first of the month, as usual, so look for that next week to offset all the expirations that I've\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Film"","block_context":{"text":"Film","link":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/category\/film\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/06\/dvd-triage3.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32823"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32823"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32823\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32884"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32823"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32823"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32823"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.the-frame.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/fort-apache.jpg\" "\\"fort-apache\\"")
<\/p>\n