Review of Comancheros, The / The Undefeated

Introduction

When it comes to films, I was raised on a diet of old Westerns and Carry On movies. That is courtesy of my parents` preferences of course. Not long after we bought our first VCR we had a copy of Chisum, which the entire family quickly memorised so that we could join in with the dialogue on screen. When I eventually displayed a personal liking for Science Fiction they came very close to disowning me. After spending your formative years watching gunfights and Barbara Windsor`s cleavage (not in the same movie I hasten to add) you could be forgiven for not wanting to see another western. Still, on occasion I do have a hankering for a good old showdown or barroom brawl, and you can`t beat the mix of action and lighthearted banter that is at the heart of a John Wayne movie. With this release from Twentieth Century Fox, you get two for the price of one.

The Undefeated

At the end of the civil war as the Confederacy surrendered to the Union, certain units couldn`t bring themselves to yield. One of them was Colonel James Langdon and his men, who rather than living under those `damned Yankees` set forth to Mexico to build a new life for them and their families. On the other side, Colonel John Henry Thomas of the US army decided that the military life was no longer for him and his few surviving men, and as a group they resigned to head South and round up wild horses to sell back to the Army. However when they had gathered their herd, the Army was no longer willing to pay top dollar and getting a better offer from the Mexicans, they also head south, where they encounter the fleeing Confederates. However, instead of picking up where they left off, they find themselves cast together in mutual adversity when they come up against bandits and Juaristas.

The Comancheros

1843, and Texas is a newly independent state. However independence isn`t easy for the fledgling nation and the citizen have recently come to be plagued by rampant Comanche attacks, killing and terrorising homesteaders. Into this mayhem comes Paul Regret, a gambler on the run from Louisiana, where he is wanted for murder. Texas wanting to be a friendly neighbour has what amounts to an extradition treaty, and as soon as his paddle steamer docks in Galveston, Regret is practically torn from the arms of a lover by Jake Cutter, Texas Ranger. While Cutter has his hands full dealing with the sneaky gambler, he is more concerned with the Comancheros, a white gang who incite the local Comanches to run riot. He goes undercover as an arms dealer to locate the Comancheros hideout, but when he and Regret get there, they are in for a nasty shock.

Video

The Undefeated

The film gets a 2.35:1 anamorphic transfer and it is clear and colourful if a tad soft. There is a bit of print damage as you would expect from a 34-year-old movie, but it`s not enough to detract from your viewing pleasure. Being a western, you`ll probably be expecting grand cinematography and epic landscapes, and you won`t be disappointed. Hills and valleys, rolling rivers and thousands of wild horses compete for your attention. It`s all very nice to look at. 7/10

The Comancheros

Also gets a 2.35:1 anamorphic transfer. The picture by and large is very good, being sharp and clear throughout with little or no print damage to speak of. It certainly lives up to the Technicolor billing with a bright and vivid palette. There are plenty of old style sets and matte paintings, interspersed with the classic western widescreen landscapes portraying wild Texas. 8/10

Audio

The Undefeated

Sound is a little disappointing though, with DD 2.0 mono soundtracks in English, French, German, Italian and Spanish. The dialogue is always clear, and Hugo Montenegro provides an epic western theme that really suits the action. It`s jut a shame that the soundtrack couldn`t have been more dynamic, doing justice to the rousing gunfights, brawls and stampedes that are standard for any half decent western. 6/10

The Comancheros gets a DD 4.0 surround track, with discrete Left, Centre and Right Channels and a general rear surround channel. Elmer Bernstein provides yet another grand western score that fills the room, but it is rather unmemorable at that. The rears are used mostly for the music and the front channels for the dialogue, but the dialogue occasionally sounds muffled and a little out of place when compared with the onscreen action. I think I would have preferred the sound as it was originally. 6/10

Features

Just trailers and subtitles for both movies.

Conclusion

The Undefeated

The Undefeated is rip-roaring fun from beginning to end. The characters are all larger than life and like every western of the period, it has plenty of action, loads of laughs and even a little romance. The story is a little on the weak side, used more as glue to hold the action together, but no-one watches a John Wayne movie for intricacies of plot. If there is a message, it`s one of reconciliation and forgiveness, as two once bitter foes come together to face a common enemy and in doing so heal their collective wounds.

The cast is excellent, with a whole host of John Wayne regulars coming together to do what they do best. There are in no way hindered by two larger than life leads that own the screen in every scene. John Wayne as John Henry Thomas and Rock Hudson as James Langdon are screen gold. Western regulars like Ben Johnson, Harry Carey Jr, Bruce Cabot, and Dub Taylor help them. Also in the cast is a fresh-faced Jan-Michael Vincent of Airwolf fame as a young confederate army Lieutenant.

This film has all you could want, with gunfights, brawls and brilliant dialogue. It`s also a typical John Wayne movie in that every problem can be solved with a timely stampede. Two hours of cinema magic. 8/10

The Comancheros

Whereas the Undefeated is undoubtedly a product of its time, The Comancheros is more of a last gasp of the more operatic westerns of the fifties. There are bundle loads of plot, and the pacy script keeps the action flowing. Again the tried and tested ingredients of a Western are all there in spades, action, laughter and romance, but the story is worth some thought as well. In modern terms, this would be a buddy movie, with John Wayne`s honourable and upstanding Texas Ranger partnered with elegant dandy gambler, Stuart Whitman, and the pair spark off well against each other.

Also in the cast is an all too brief appearance from Lee Marvin as Tully Crow an eccentric character that steals the movie for the short time that he appears. The usual Western characters appear, including Bruce Cabot and Patrick Wayne, son of John as two more Texas rangers. Among the bad guys you`ll find character actors Jack Elam and Michael Ansara chewing the scenery with the best of them. Making a change from most Westerns is the inclusion of an intelligent bad guy, Graile played by Nehemiah Persoff, who has set up his own ideal society among the lawless and the Comanches. He`s the kind of evil genius that you would usually find in James Bond movies, not John Wayne ones. Ina Balin as Pilar supplies the romantic interest, and she makes a brave early attempt at an independent woman, long before Charlie`s Angels.

For those who care, The Comancheros is cut by the BBFC…

"When submitted to the BBFC the work had a running time of 102m 56s.

To obtain this category, cuts of 0m 8s were required. The cuts were Compulsory.
Distributor was required to remove three shots of horses being twisted by neck and onto back in accordance with the Cinematograph Films (Animals) Act 1937."

The Comancheros is a western of the old school, full of adventure and excitement, good guys and bad guys, and loads of gunfights. The romance and spectacle of the early westerns meets the widescreen epics of the sixties and the result is an intelligent film on a grand scale. 8/10

The colourful and more thoughtful Comancheros combined with the brash and energetic Undefeated make for a varied double pack that is well worth watching. It helps if you like westerns of course, and these two films are unabashedly unreconstructed examples of the genre. There is something refreshingly honest about films where the `Injuns` are the bad guys and moralising and philosophising are best left to Easterners. In the West, all you need is a six-shooter and loyal horse. Also seeing these films as nature intended is a revelation compared to the cropped square pictures of my childhood, time as well as a widescreen ratio has added a certain grandeur to these films.

Finally if you lament at the thought of a Western, remember that John Wayne was the Arnold Schwarzenegger of his time, but with charisma and talent.