The Last Frontier (1955)
The Last Frontier (1955)
DVD5 | VIDEO_TS | NTSC | 16:9 | 720?480 | 4300 kbps | 4.0Gb
Audio: English AC3 3.0 @ 448 Kbps | Subtitles: English, Japanese
01:38:00 | USA | History, Western
DVD5 | VIDEO_TS | NTSC | 16:9 | 720?480 | 4300 kbps | 4.0Gb
Audio: English AC3 3.0 @ 448 Kbps | Subtitles: English, Japanese
01:38:00 | USA | History, Western
Having been robbed of a year's worth of skins by marauding Indians, Jed Cooper (Mature), Gus Hideout (James Whitmore), and Mungo (Pat Hogan) sign on at a nearby fort. Jed, however, falls in love with Corinna (Anne Bancroft), the refined wife of the commanding officer, Colonel Marston (Robert Preston), and when the latter begins to plan an all-out attack on an unruly Indian tribe, he attempts to prevent what, in all likelihood, will be a mass slaughter.
Director: Anthony Mann
Cast: Victor Mature, Guy Madison, Robert Preston, James Whitmore, Anne Bancroft, Russell Collins, Peter Whitney, Pat Hogan, Guillermo Calles, John L. Cason, Manuel Donde, Bill Hale, Mickey Kuhn, Regis Parton, Jack Pennick, Allen Pinson, Robert St. Angelo, William Traylor, Guy Williams, Terry Wilson
The Last Frontier (1955)
The Last Frontier (1955)
IMDb
Crude and uncivilized backwoods trapper Jed Cooper and his two partners sign up as scouts in a remote Oregon army fort, manned chiefly by untrained rookie soldiers. Jed, flirting with the idea of leading a more settled life, decides he needs a woman to start the process, and selects Corinna Marston, the beautiful young wife of Colonel Marston, commander of the next fort down the line. Marston arrives and announces to commanding officer Captain Riordan that he has lost his fort and most of his men to an Indian attack and that he, as ranking officer, is assuming command. Riordan, a young, but sensible officer, is outraged when he learns that Marston, posted out west for having lost his 1500-man command during a Civil War battle, has ordered the entire fort's complement, totally unprepared for combat and outnumbered, to march out against experienced Indian warriors.
~ Doug Sederberg
The Last Frontier (1955)
DVDTalk
Anthony Mann directed some of the best Westerns of the 1950s: Winchester '73 (1950), Bend of the River (1952), The Tin Star (1957), Man of the West (1958). Many starred James Stewart, and after the two had a falling out actors like Henry Fonda and Gary Cooper filled the void until Mann shifted gears toward big-scale historical epics during the 1960s. The Last Frontier (1955) is among the least remembered of Mann's Westerns; Victor Mature stars this time, and the film is a sub-Fort Apache (1948) with a lot of heavy-handed moralizing. It's not very good, though Mature is fine.
The film takes place during the last days of the Civil War, where out in the wilderness the dregs of the U.S. Cavalry continue to encroach upon Indian land. Illiterate trappers Jed Cooper (Mature), Irishman Gus (James Whitmore), and half-breed Mungo (Pat Hogan) are ambushed by an Indian tribe led by Chief Red Cloud (Manuel Donde). Unhappy with the "blue coat's" new forts and their "civilization," Red Cloud takes his frustrations out on the trappers, who never bothered anybody. Robbed of their guns, their horses, and a year's worth of trap, the three make their way to Fort Shallan, where Captain Glenn Riordan (Guy Madison) offers the men jobs as scouts.
Meanwhile, martinet Col. Frank Marston (Robert Preston), having lost his own fort to Indian raids, also makes camp at Fort Shallan, and as senior officer takes command. A reckless leader, Marston is already responsible for the death of 1,500 men at the Battle of Shiloh, and his blood-lust against the local Indians is barely concealed. Against everyone's advice, he insists on launching a suicidal attack against Red Cloud, and the future of Fort Shallan is very much in doubt.
Adapted from Richard Emery Roberts' novel The Gilded Rooster, Philip Yordan** and Russell S. Hughes's screenplay is an overly symbolic character study contrasting the uneducated, uncivilized and undisciplined but good-natured Cooper with the reckless and dangerously irresponsible Marston. Where Gus and Mungo are reluctant to hire themselves out as scouts, Cooper is attracted to military life, and aspires to become a genuine soldier. He enjoys imitating their salute and late in the story wears a cavalry jacket he had earlier found on the body of a dead Indian. (Marston, significantly, says he's "not a man without" his uniform.) Cooper's childlike admiration for the Cavalry and disillusionment watching Marston's abuse of power destroy what it stands for is the heart of the film, but it doesn't amount to much.
Part of the problem is that Marston is simply a Bad Guy with little shading, though the screenwriters try to add some through his loveless relationship with wife Corinna (Anne Bancroft, her hair dyed blonde). Cooper and Corinna also have a brief romance, which isn't believable given her relative sophistication and his Neanderthal-like manners. Marston is an uninspired variation of Henry Fonda's Thursby from the much-superior Fort Apache, and lacks that character's subtle arrogance.
All things considered, Mature comes off surprisingly well. An underrated talent, he was very good within a very limited range, playing larger-than-life men of action, often blind-sided by events that call into question the direction of their lives. Mature was actually quite good in The Robe (1953) and its sequel, Demetrious and the Gladiators (1954), both enormous hits, and later in films like After the Fox (1966), which poked fun at his screen persona. In contrast Preston and Bancroft, both better actors than Mature, are far removed from their strengths and flail about helplessly. Only James Whitmore, in another fine character piece, makes any impression.
The Last Frontier (1955)
The Last Frontier (1955)
