User Reviews

This very controversial B&W Warner film of 1940 is both an entertaining cavalry western, with several horse chases and shootouts, and an exposition of the philosophical conflicts between pro and anti-slavery proponents, that foreshadowed secession and a long bloody war between the states. As entertainment, it provides an excellent mix of action, drama, humor, mesmerizing monologues by Raymond Massey(John Brown), romance with Olivia de Havilland, and patter within and between the buddy pairs of Errol Flynn(JEB Stuart) and Ronald Reagan(Custer), and Alan Hale and 'Big Boy' Williams.

Van Heflin's purely fictional obnoxious character provides an additional element of conflict as a sinister devote of Brown, who proves to have more in common with Benedict Arnold, after not receiving his expected due share of glory and monetary reward for his contributions to the cause. His vengeful role of alerting Federal troops in Washington to Brown's current raid on the Harper's Ferry arsenal has no historical relevancy. Brown's actual force was much smaller than depicted, and mostly neutralized by local militia before Federal troops arrived.

As others have abundantly detailed, there are numerous historical inaccuracies in the details in the story of Brown's quest to end slavery in the US, which is what this film is essentially about. Unfortunately, this was standard fare for most Hollywood films of this era. This film has received more than it's share of criticism in this regard because of the emotional central issue of slavery and because the gist of the story is widely known. For example, I don't see damning criticism of the highly distorted contrasts between historic kings Richard and John, in "The Adventures of Robin Hood", because these distortions are not known by the American audiences and lack the emotional impact of Brown's story. Despite all the historical inaccuracies and distortions in details, I believe this film still captures the essence of the times, which is what historically-oriented films should attempt to do.

This film clearly favors the view, articulated by Flynn, that slavery would have gradually disappeared from the South over time, without the necessity of southern secession or a bloody war. Clearly, this view offends many reviewers. However, without the ill-advised secession of the southern states as an unwarranted knee-jerk response to the election of Lincoln as president, this is what likely would have happened, despite the schemes of abolitionists. Savvy southern leaders, such as R.E. Lee, Jefferson Davis(both briefly included in the film), and Sam Houston, opposed secession as unwise, realizing that it failed to solve the problem of a lack of new territories for selling excess slaves, and risked widespread destruction by a stronger Union military response.

Many reviewers are sarcastic about the convenient fictional West Point 'class of '54', which included a bunch of commonly recognized names in the future Civil War. Of those mentioned, only Flynn's JEB Stuart actually graduated that year. Seems like his buddy in the film should have been his Union counterpart in the war: Phil Sheridan, who graduated the year before. Presumably, the much younger Custer was chosen because of his much more widely recognized name. In any case, the short-shorn Flynn and Reagan bore no physical resemblance to the normally long-haired or well-bearded historical personages.

It's Massey's fervent portrayal of Brown that makes this film most memorable. This was the role of a lifetime for him. In some scenes, Brown is portrayed as a murdering madman. In other scenes, he seems the Christ-like messiah he fancies himself to be, thus providing a basis for either view. Brown's hanging is staged as resembling Christ's crucifixion on Calvary Hill, including his Christ-like speech.. Massey often played fanatics or villains, including Lincoln, who was fanatical about making the southern states rejoin the Union, at the cost of a long bloody war. Other memorable characters he played include: the crooked salvager of sunken ship cargoes , in "Reap the Wild Wind", and the slimy villains in the Scott western "Carson City" and the musical "Desert Song".

It's my contention that all 3 of Warner's Flynn-starring films released in 1940 have an intended subliminal message of presenting a strong united front against the very clear threat of a fascist-dominated Europe. This is most obvious in the Elizabethan sea war drama "The Sea Hawk", in which the Spanish clearly are presented as analogous to the Nazis in their ambition to take out England as a rival. In "Virginia City", near the end, Union and Confederate elements join together to fight off Bogart's bandidos, who want to steal the contested large gold shipment. This is followed by Flynn's eloquent Lincolnesk speech about binding the nation's wounds, after Lee's surrender. The present film features future Union and Confederate military leaders fighting together to suppress fanatical agitators who threaten to instigate a disunion of the states. Also, I strongly suspect that Brown, as characterized, is actually a metaphor for the dangerous fanatical Hitler: once a street agitator himself. As he is hanged, Lee remarks: "So perish all such foes of mankind". Going back a couple of years, we see a similar message in the replacement of Saxon-abusing acting -King John with the united ethnic policy of King Richard, in the Flynn-starring "Adventures of Robin Hood".

For history buffs this must be more of a Santa Fe trial. Here is John Brown (a real historical figure played by Raymond Massey) demanding money from Boston abolitionists (also real) just before the Civil War. Give me the money, he shouts, and I'll start a slave revolution in the upland South. He knows that country. It's filled with hiding places for guerrilla warriors. So he and his handful devoted followers take over the federal arsenal and settle down in Harper's Ferry, Virginia. The tiny town was, and is, a sinkhole at the confluence of two rivers. If you stand in the main street of Harper's Ferry and look in any direction, all you see are tall wooded hills looming over you. It's about the least defensible place on the planet. There are a few African-Americans in the movie. The script has one of them say something like: "Mistuh Brown, he promised us da freedom. But if dis here Kansis is freedom, I wants to go back to Texas where Ah kin live mah lahf in PEACE." You bet.

However, let us skip over the anachronisms -- the absence of muskets, the presence of generic Colt pistols, the fact that Jeb Stuart (Errol Flynn), George Armstrong Custer (Ronald Reagan), Bell, Sheridan, Longstreet, Hood, and Pickett didn't graduate from West Point in the same year -- and examine the movie as a Ding an Sich.

The errors of time are lost in the headlong pace of this Western. And it IS a Western, though some scenes are set in the East. There is never any doubt who the good guys are. They're the ones who shoot their pistols jauntily, without aiming, and hit their targets. John Brown and his followers are bad guys, yes, but with mitigation, your Honor. His passion to free the slaves was all right, but his violent methods were all wrong. Every Western, though, must have a genuinely evil guy and in this case it's Van Heflin. His character seems lashed together in haste. At West Point, before he's thrown out, he reads treasonous literature to the other cadets and gets into fist fights (with Flynn!) over the issue of slavery. By the end, he's revealed as a craven money-grabber who only joined Brown's movement for the moolah, and when it's denied him he squeals on Brown to the government. That's known as discontinuity. I speak here not of historical inaccuracy but of dramatic clumsiness. God help me, my phraseology has been contaminated by listening to John Brown's dialog.

You ought to see this movie if only for Raymond Massey's overblown portrait of John Brown. He never blinks. His eyes bulge -- and I swear I'm not making this up -- his eyes bulge until the dark irises are completely surrounded by white. I just tried it in the mirror and I can't even come close.

There is an attempt at comedy. Its instruments are Alan Hale and Guinn "Big Boy" Williams. It fails dismally. Nothing they say or do would be funny to anyone with a sensibility quotient higher than that of a head of broccoli. The delightful Olivia de Havilland plays "Kit Carson" Halliday, the girl Flynn marries while rival Reagan stands by, shrugs good-naturedly, and smiles. The real Custer later married a smashing brunette named Libby, almost as attractive as de Havilland.

It's a straightforward Warners production with Flynn, Reagan, Michael Curtiz, Max Steiner, Perc Westmore, and Sol Polito all hard at work in the factory, turning out their fast, unpretentious, actioners and dramas in their classic style.

"Santa Fe Trail" only nominally lives up to it's title, serving as a backdrop to it's story of abolitionist John Brown (Raymond Massey) and his zealous mission to ban slavery in pre Civil War America. Most of the action takes place in 'Bloody Kansas', still a territory in 1854 and home of Fort Leavenworth, the U.S. Army's most dangerous outpost. It's where hot headed members of West Point's graduating class of the same year wind up being assigned, including J.E.B. Stuart (Errol Flynn) of Virginia and George Custer (Ronald Reagan) of Ohio. Though the military men would find themselves on opposite sides in the Civil War, the film finds itself in the middle, straddling the line of dedication to duty and leaving matters of policy to civil authority. Depending on one's point of view, that's either noble or a cop out, as the soldiers face no moral quandaries. Their mission is simply to bring John Brown to justice, dead or alive.

It's interesting to reflect on the film from a historical perspective today, some sixty six years after it was made, while only seventy five years after the end of the Civil War. The portrayal of blacks in movies often found single characters in subservient or comedic roles, but here a slave family on the way to freedom is portrayed as human, terrified of confrontation aboard a train bound for still neutral Kansas Territory. Their plight is given even more meaningful resonance later in the film when John Brown finds he must leave Kansas to avoid capture. "Does just sayin' so make us free...?" one of the former slaves wonders, fearing he may not be equipped for that privilege.

Historical inaccuracies aside, I found the film to be exciting and entertaining, assembling many of Warner Brothers' stars and stock players, along with masterful director Michael Curtiz. Flynn and Reagan generally share equal screen time, vying for the attention of Kit Carson Holliday (Olivia DeHavilland), whose father Cyrus (Henry O'Neill) lends credence to the story's backdrop financing the construction of the Santa Fe Railroad. As in the same year's "Virginia City", Flynn is supported by those two flat footed rum-pots, Guinn "Big Boy" Williams and Alan Hale, whose comedic camaraderie is injected at just the right moments. However when the spotlight is on Raymond Massey, it's difficult to turn away; the energy and zeal he brings to the character of John Brown is totally absorbing. His performance is reminiscent of an earlier portrayal, that of the unwavering protagonist Cabal in the 1936 film "Things to Come".

I'm surprised it took me so long to get around to "Santa Fe Trail", since it's a public domain staple and available virtually everywhere as a single film or in compilation with other Westerns. For those who find it enjoyable, I'd also recommend "They Died With Their Boots On", another Errol Flynn feature in which he's cast as General George Armstrong Custer. He gives Custer some of the flamboyance and arrogance that the history books recall, traits not acknowledged in Ronald Reagan's take on the character.

Outstanding pre-civil war drama. I guess that Raymond Massey was destined to freeing the slaves. Not only is he John Brown in this terrific film, the same year he was Abe Lincoln in "Abe Lincoln in Illinois."

There is so much irony here with the characters of Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee playing union officers in hot pursuit of anarchist Brown, the latter's violent anti-slavery position would lead him and his family to ultimate doom.

Olivia De Havilland vies for the affection of Ronald Reagan and Errol Flynn, the latter a southerner in the Union Army.

We see the divisions of the ultimate catastrophe in West Point and with the John Brown fiasco.