40 Guns to Apache Pass

This joke of a movie -- with terrible acting, a thin plot and cheap production values -- at least gave me a laugh once when I badly needed one. For some unaccountable reason, they sent us this movie about the cavalry to see when we were serving in the actual 1st Cavalry (Airmobile) in Vietnam.

These guys couldn't shoot straight, except for the few times when a single shot felled multiple Indians, but they also could not be wounded, even when taking cover behind the flimsiest rail fence.

So little thought went into this movie that it deserves to be ranked among the worst of all time. However, I gave it a second star because of the laughs.

Murphy does all the right things but they are the same heroics and " it's okay I'm just shot in the chest so I ain't gonna flinch" routine as westerns had ten and twenty years before. It's hard to believe this film was made in the era of the American Indian movement and the Beatles etc. This film also reminds me of why the western faded. The Indians here are simple ciphers. They are portrayed as mindless " hostiles" and the western clichés are trotted out. The" whites" are heroics defenders, the Indians are savages. 1967 was far too late for that to play any more. I laughed when the opening line was " there were only a few brave men stopping the whole Territory of Arizona being overrun".they meant of course a few brave settlers from the east. But it struck me as odd that in 67 the line was not in any way used for irony. The few brave men were in fact Indians defending their community and the overrunning was being done by " whites". Overall it's workmanlike effort but nothing really distinguished this film from any production line western from the 50's. Murphy seems tired but competent and remarkably well preserved for a WWII veteran.

40 Guns to Apache Pass is directed by William Witney and written by Willard and Mary Willingham. It stars Audie Murphy and Kenneth Tobey. Music is by Richard LaShelle and Jaques R. Marquette photographs it in Pathe Color with location work coming at Lovejoy Buttes, Red Rock Canyon and North Ranch in California.

The Apaches, led by Cochise (Michael Keep), are on the warpath and vowing to kill all whites they come across. Captain Bruce Coburn (Murphy) is in charge of leading homesteaders out of harms way. But there is unrest in the band of men under his charge and mutiny is afoot.

This was the last but one film Murphy made before retiring, you feel that he hoped this would be a fitting swan song to his career. It wasn't. Saddled with a weak script and surrounded by wooden supporting actors, Murphy alone can't make this lacklustre, cliché riddled, Western work. There's some nice scenery shot by Witney and Marquette, but with LaShelle scoring it like an episode of Scooby Doo the impact is lost. It would be easy to blame director Witney, a man more than capable of stringing together an action based movie, but asking him to try and make this particular screenplay stretch to over an hour and half was asking for the impossible.

3/10 for Murphy's manful efforts to carry such a low-budget, routine and forgettable piece.

Here's the bad news about this film. It has a ridiculous narration that keeps telling us what we don't need to be told. And the music is hit or miss, sometimes appropriate to what's being shown, and sometimes seriously off, sounding like merry go round music when major action is happening.

If those things were corrected, then the rest of the film's flaws are lesser and could have been put up with. The acting is good in some parts and with other actors not quite good enough. The story is OK and has some thrilling bits in the last half.

If you're an Audie Murphy fan, then you may want to watch this, but it's not as good as some of his earlier films.

So sad, why didn't he change over to modern action films.

40 GUNS TO APACHE PASS (1966) was the last starring western for war hero-turned-western star Audie Murphy, who had ended his fruitful 15-year association with Universal Pictures the previous year. Released by Columbia Pictures, it turned out to be an unfitting send-off, undercut by an extremely low budget, a talky script, and an undistinguished no-name cast (aside from Murphy and screen vet Kenneth Tobey).

The plot might have made a good western had it been accorded a bigger budget and a stronger cast. A beleaguered Arizona cavalry division harassed by Cochise and his Apache warriors is expecting a shipment of repeating rifles, which could mean the difference between life and death for Apache Wells, an outpost housing the army and surviving settlers. The weapons become the object of less-than-intense conflict involving the Cavalry, the Indians and, later, a renegade group of army deserters. Murphy plays Captain Coburn, a no-nonsense type who romances a settler's daughter (Laraine Stephens) and agrees to take her two younger brothers (Michael Blodgett, Michael Burns) into the undermanned regiment after their father is killed in an attack. A display of cowardice by the youngest brother (Burns) has dire consequences, resulting in a meandering subplot requiring his redemption.

The production values here are far less polished than one would find in a typical TV western of the time, such as "Wagon Train" or "The Virginian." The no-name performers overact and are given reams of unnecessary dialogue in order to pad out the film's running time. Frequent narration tells us things we can see for ourselves. Most of the film was shot at ordinary-looking Southern California ranch locations. All this is especially disappointing given the participation of director William Witney, a one-time action specialist at Republic Pictures, who'd been directing for 30 years at this point.

Things pick up, however, in the film's final third when Corporal Bodine (Kenneth Tobey), a vengeful ex-sergeant with a grudge against Murphy, decides he has other plans for the 40 rifles and convinces four of the remaining soldiers from the escort to accompany him. Murphy, who'd been left for dead, has to get the rifles back while Burns, the cowardly brother, has to prove himself a man. This section of the film was shot in more remote California locations which actually pass for Arizona and features a larger band of Apaches on the prowl as Murphy undertakes a holding action, guarding a pass alone with a stack of fully loaded repeating rifles. Director Witney's considerable expertise kicks in during this stretch and gives a hint of what might have been. Composer Richard LaSalle pumps things up with a rousing, if clichéd, score

Audie Murphy only appeared in two more films, both little-seen. First was the international thriller, TRUNK TO CAIRO (1966), directed by future Cannon Films mogul Menahem Golan, while his final film was the Budd Boetticher western, A TIME FOR DYING (1969), which Murphy produced and appeared in briefly as Jesse James.