Le Fils de Geronimo

"The Savage", an unforgettable western directed by George Marshall and starring Charlton Heston in the beginning of his film career, is a sensitive film, which was able to show the Indian in a humane and friendly way. We must consider that the film was when the Indians appeared only as hostile, dangerous and treacherous beings whose life was worthless. Not deserve any respect and kill them anything represented as punishment to whites. Some films have sought to show a more humanized Indians (the optimal "Devil's Doorway" directed by Anthony Mann, with Robert Taylor, and "Broken Arrow" directed by Delmer Daves, with James Stewart, and Jeff Chandler playing the role of Cochise). But "The Savage" is a powerful film pro-Indians, when we observe the course of the plot the immense love that united Jim Aherne, white adopted as an infant by the Indians, and their adoptive parents. It is wonderful to see the relationship between the three, valued for outstanding performance from Charlton Heston and also Ian MacDonald, a great role. The same Ian MacDonald almost simultaneously starred in High Noon, with Gary Cooper, playing the role of villain killer. And yet we can see the beautiful Joan Taylor in the role of Luta, of great expression. I consider "The Savage" a classic, a film of extreme sensitivity and very enjoyable to watch. It's one of my favorite westerns.

Coming two years after "broken arrow",this movie continues in the same vein:the Indians are treated as human beings who have wisdom and whose struggle is legitimate.Most of them are loyal,even if there are traitors and cowards among them(the same goes for the white ones).Actually,it's John Ford who came first as an Indians' champion with "fort Apache"(1948).

"The savage" is a moderately satisfying western,which owes a lot to Charlton Heston's majestic presence.The pastoral scenes are nice enough but they don't cut these of "Broken arrow".For instance, the female character has not Debra Paget's radiant presence and anyway she disappears too soon.The direction has neither Daves' lyricism,nor Ford's or Mann's epic inspiration,even less Walsh's madness.Sometimes Georges Marshall (and his scriptwriters) look like school teachers,giving good and bad marks, sometimes to the Indians,sometimes to the "soldier blue".

The topic of the man torn between two cultures will be resumed by Martin Ritt in the sixties (Hombre,1967)and Kevin Costner's "Dance with wolves" will be a successful update of "broken arrow".As for Marshall's film,Charlton Heston's numerous fans may appreciate his convincing rendition.

This colorful western adventure has a nice mixture of action and moral dilemma as hostilities break out between the cavalry and Indians. Charlton Heston, in one of his early roles, is obliged to walk a fine line between loyalty and treason, as an adopted son of a chief and as a cavalry scout. The picture was filmed in South Dakota's lush Black Hills, a country of great natural beauty. There are cavalry-Indian skirmishes and intrigue at the army post as Heston plays both ends against the middle. As both sides prepare for battle, the pressure mounts for Heston to be a hero or a renegade, and bring peace or destruction for his Sioux brethren. Peter Hansen, Richard Rober and Milburne Stone are among the good cast and Susan Morrow and Joan Taylor are the ladies who are smitten with Heston, one as a scout, the other as a Sioux warrior. Paul Sawtell contributes another fine score, a spare, melancholy accompaniment to a golden-age western.

The Savage is directed by George Marshall and adapted to screenplay by Sydney Boehm from the novel The Renegade written by L.L. Foreman. It stars Charlton Heston, Susan Morrow, Ian MacDonald, Peter Hansen, Joan Taylor, Richard Rober, Ted de Corsia, Frank Richards and Don Porter. Music is by Paul Sawtell and cinematography by John F. Seitz.

It's an honourable failure, a film of good pro Indian intentions, but ultimately the narrative thrust is dampened by a script not prepared to challenge its themes. Plot finds young Jim Aherne (Orly Lindgren) as the only survivor of a wagon train attack by the Crow Indians who are not prepared to adhere to the newly called for truce between the whites and the reds. Fortunately for Jim, the Sioux come along and see off the Crow and the Sioux chief raises him as his own son in the Indian traditions. Growing up to be Warbonnet (Heston), he's a happy man, but trouble is brewing between the whites and the reds and Warbonnet gets torn between loyalties.

What transpires is a familiar thread that sees Warbonnet, a white man by birth but Indian of upbringing, see at first hand racism and foolhardy politics from both sides of the fence. There's a good quota of action spread throughout the pic, with the location photography around the Black Hills of Dakota making for a pleasing backdrop, and there's some well structured passages that let Heston strut his stuff. Yet it never adds up to being more than a gentle sermon, with characters that basically can't veer from the standard old fashioned formula of such pictorial genre pieces.

Worth a viewing for Heston and Western purists, but not worth hunting high and low for. 6/10

Let us never forget that director George Marshall was maybe like Richard Thorpe a very prolific film maker, beginning his career during the silent period, and then resuming his filmography with all kinds of movies, comedies - even with Laurel and Hardy - dramas, adventures, crime and above all westerns: THE SAVAGE, THE SHEEPMAN, GUNS FOR FORT PETTICOAT, and a segment of HOW THE WEST WAS WON, PILLARS OF THE SKY and the two versions of DESTRY; as George Miller with his both MAD MAX, decades later. That said this western is verry rare in terms of topic. I try to remember a western with a reverse scheme, an Indian raised by White folks....