Alvarez Kelly

Classic, Classic, Classic! Yeah, you can complain about being a bit slow nearly 50 years later, but what movie from that time wasn't. This movie is loosely based on Hampton's and General Rosser's Cattle Raid. Not filmed in Virginia, but I am from near Richmond and played as a child on some of the land the actual raid crossed over and it has the same feel. Holden and Widmark both hit home runs, hard to tell which is better. Widmark has the southern Virginia accent down pat, he sounds like a couple of my uncles which were about his age. The score and the cinematography just add to the ambiance. There are some slight imperfections with the script, but the strengths of this film tower over it's shortcomings.

Good surprise for a film by Edward Dmytryk. The scenario is rich and invites an interesting story with multiple twists on an original theme. Because it is about showing the confrontations between the northerners and the Confederates who are fighting over a herd of cows that will be used to feed a regiment on one side and a besieged city on the other. There is therefore a lot at stake in taking possession of the herd. Which is one thing, but then you have to know how to manage the cows and the herd.

That's where William Holden comes in, between the two sides, playing a Mexican, actually a Texan, who brings the herd, but finds himself kidnapped by one side, then the other. He is in the middle of everyone and is motivated by money, and women, because he will find his interest thanks to the female characters he will meet. First Victoria Shaw and then Janice Rule, Richard Widmark's fiancée, but who will leave him; elements of romantic comedy and love triangle are well integrated into the action.

The script contains multiple twists and turns. The film relies mainly on the relationship between Richard Widmark and William Holden, which is very mechanical, but works in the end, via their relationship to the female characters.

This ensemble works and is successful.

Most reviews here range from mixed to egregious. Except for a few shocking holes in the script and underproduced scenes (e.g. the Confederate ambush at the apple cellar and Stedman's escape with Ruthie and her subsequent death), just like a kid at the movies I felt swept up in the film's patched-together, on-with-the-show spirit.

Given the production's reliance on a cattle herd as its main prop and the health problems of its aging stars, much credit goes to the film's editors. Plus one must bow to the astonishing gift of William Holden, reportedly a wreck throughout the making, but managing his horse like a pro and looking like a man you or any woman would keep giving another chance.

Overall this film probably represents a pathetic last gasp of the studio system whose problems are worthy of dismay, but once again that studio system produced a work that soldiers on to some kind of colorful, noisy, almost dignified end.

It's 1864. The south is losing and starving for beef. Her armies have been driven back to Richmond. Mexican cattleman Alvarez Kelly (William Holden) is delivering a herd of cattle to the Union under Major Albert Stedman (Patrick O'Neal)'s directions. The two men do not get along. They come upon southern lady Charity Warwick who invites them for dinner. She's working with Confederate raiders led by Colonel Tom Rossiter (Richard Widmark) and they kidnap Kelly. The Confederates want him to lead a cattle drive into Richmond.

William Holden's macho defiance does the opposite of its intention. It's suppose to show how real these characters are but it just shows how fake it actually is. They aren't black and white but in a real situation, Rossiter would be a lot more harsher. Instead of yacking it up behind enemy lines, he would hog-tie and drag Kelly as quickly as possible back to Richmond. Once there, Kelly would never be allowed to mingle with society. I actually got excited when Rossiter shoots Kelly's finger off. That's more fitting of the situation. It's a half step up from standardized characterizations. I would like for them to take the full step. Also Stedman should have arrested Warwick. He's willing to shoot a Mexican for stealing a bottle of wine but the white lady gets away free and clear. I guess nothing has changed over the years. It would be more compelling if he arrested her and freed her slaves. I actually like the slaves being uncooperative but it would be interesting to see them if their master gets arrested. This is a great premise for a war movie adapted from a real battle. It deserves to be a tougher, grittier war movie. I like the cattle drive but unless cows are suddenly bulletproof, that situation would never be real. Nevertheless, it's a fun unusual war movie.

I have just watched this movie on Spain's Canal Sur, in Spanish, which probably did not make much difference, as the Spaniards are wizards at dubbing, and the main character in any case is an Irish-Mexican. In addition, I avoided by this means Widmark's Southern drawl, said by those better qualified to judge than myself to be hilariously bogus. When I have seen him in films with English dialogue including Westerns, he has always sounded very urban to me, probably hailing from some part of New York and I have never noticed that he has attempted to change his accent before. So this was probably an isolated attempt that didn't work out. He is, nonetheless, an excellent actor, and we must recall that even our late great Sir John Gielgud made a terrible hash of this too, on the very rare occasions he was induced to speak with a different accent from his plum-in-the mouth, silver tones.

If you are looking for a Western of the inferior spaghetti type (I do not include Sergio Leone in that description), with non-stop violence and a corpse a minute, be sure to give this one a miss! Although a war film, its mood for the greater part of the footage is great calm, but a calm fraught with tensions. It takes at least three quarters of an hour for the first death to occur (unless there was a fatality at the Alvarez hacienda in the first few seconds, which I happened to miss, and that is unlikely). And immediately after this fatality, a party of Blues capture a party of Greys, who with hardly a pause turn the tables on the former, but without causing any further losses to either side or even anybody getting wounded. The development of the plot is mainly without physical action, so that I must admit it does tend to drag at times. The main protagonists quietly and stealthily pitch their wits against each other: that is why the incident of the severed finger(already mentioned on the general introduction page) comes as such a brutal shock. But the true nature of war, including the American Civil War, is like that: much manoeuvring (Am. maneuvering) without very much happening for most of the time, interrupted by sporadic, sudden flare-ups.

The main characters are well-drawn with many quirks and foibles and there is much humour in their interaction and the awkward situations they find themselves in. A good example of this is the frustration of Widmark, the one-eyed Confederate colonel, who with the reluctant help of the devious civilian,but pro tem acting colonel, Holden, tries to turn the dude grey-coated soldiers into competent cow-hands. Both Widmark and Holden take turns in being the butt of the various ironies, but the stiff-necked, self-opiniated and bumbling Union major played by O'Neill, is the object of such ironies for most of his on-screen time, including from his commanding officer.

The photography is good, the scenery (supposed to be Virginian although the film was said to be shot in Louisiana) is very beautiful, and the costumery and indoor décor quite colourful and well-researched. The women,however, are rather insipid, especially when compared to those belles in a similar situation in the Wayne-Holden opus "The Horse Soldiers", not to mention the vivacious Vivienne Leigh in "Gone with the Wind", though that is an unfair comparison.

Not a movie,then, for those Western fans who like fast action. But, if you are patient enough, there is a terrific finale with a battle, which (to avoid giving too much away), is very reminiscent of a scene from "How the West was Won" which also involved Richard Widmark and, now I come to think of it, also of a sequence in "The Wild Bunch", starring Holden.

Although I had already been around for some time when this film first came out, I had hitherto never seen it or even heard of it, despite the fact that I am quite fond of good Westerns, a fan of both the main actors, and have have often been impressed by O'Neill too. I can only imagine that this occurred because it proved a commercial flop, by reason of the faults above-mentioned, and was shelved. It had never been shown before on the channel where I saw it, and there is little that they do not repeat again and again and again.