Widescreen in Full Screen presentation. Weird. How it was displayed. Don't know if anyone else experienced that, but I did. Man, they didn't even try having the Natives in this even look like Natives. They looked like white dudes wearing costumes. The only thing Native about Cheyenne is her name. Apparently her mother was a full blooded Native yet she's a true redhead and white as snow. Not that it couldn't happen but, for the time the film takes place, highly unrealistic.
There are no good guys in this film. Everyone is bad. Cheyenne's bad, Daley's bad, the Sheriff's bad, Parnell's bad, everyone's bad. There's no one to root for. They could have had an antihero, and perhaps that was to be Cheyenne but all for naught. The script was so misogynistic. Oh, yeah, Cheyenne is the leader of a "gang" but everyone in that gang just talked about bedding her and showing her what a "true man" is. Except the old geezers in the film; they were afraid of her because, you know...she's part Native. Daley finds his wife and then all of a sudden those old geezers who were afraid of Cheyenne the next second are making fun of her to her face. Does that make sense? No, it doesn't.
I watched this because of Rhonda Fleming. Enjoyed her role in "While the City Sleeps" from 1956 (two years prior to this film) and she was way better in "The Redhead and the Cowboy" from 1951. Personally, I think it was the script. It just seemed rushed and convoluted trite. JW Cody was the closest to a 'Native', I guess. Almost every film he was ever in he played an 'Indian'. Remember that Native crying in that commercial years back? That's him. His parents were Italian. His real name was Espera Oscar de Corti, though he apparently denied that to his death; he gave himself the name "Iron Eyes". I guess since he adopted (supposedly) two Native children he thought that made him Native, too? I'm related, by blood, to Puerto Ricans but that doesn't make me Puerto Rican. John Ford used actual Natives in his films. I know this is a B-Western but still...other Westerns may have used white people in the forefront but used actual Natives in supporting and/or as extras. I just dislike white-washing.
Anyway, the story is about a woman (Fleming) who marries a criminal named Daley (Guy Madison) to set him up for a 'robbery' so she can collect the inheritance of her father. Daley, somehow, gets away from the coppers (wink wink) and finds his wife, who set him up, and takes over her business. She tries to get it back from him by scheming etc., but ends up loving the abuse (because women love to be dominated, you know? especially by people they themselves set up to take the fall for crimes they commit -- see the 'convoluted trite' aspect?) and they live happily ever after.
There are no good guys in this film. Everyone is bad. Cheyenne's bad, Daley's bad, the Sheriff's bad, Parnell's bad, everyone's bad. There's no one to root for. They could have had an antihero, and perhaps that was to be Cheyenne but all for naught. The script was so misogynistic. Oh, yeah, Cheyenne is the leader of a "gang" but everyone in that gang just talked about bedding her and showing her what a "true man" is. Except the old geezers in the film; they were afraid of her because, you know...she's part Native. Daley finds his wife and then all of a sudden those old geezers who were afraid of Cheyenne the next second are making fun of her to her face. Does that make sense? No, it doesn't.
I watched this because of Rhonda Fleming. Enjoyed her role in "While the City Sleeps" from 1956 (two years prior to this film) and she was way better in "The Redhead and the Cowboy" from 1951. Personally, I think it was the script. It just seemed rushed and convoluted trite. JW Cody was the closest to a 'Native', I guess. Almost every film he was ever in he played an 'Indian'. Remember that Native crying in that commercial years back? That's him. His parents were Italian. His real name was Espera Oscar de Corti, though he apparently denied that to his death; he gave himself the name "Iron Eyes". I guess since he adopted (supposedly) two Native children he thought that made him Native, too? I'm related, by blood, to Puerto Ricans but that doesn't make me Puerto Rican. John Ford used actual Natives in his films. I know this is a B-Western but still...other Westerns may have used white people in the forefront but used actual Natives in supporting and/or as extras. I just dislike white-washing.
Anyway, the story is about a woman (Fleming) who marries a criminal named Daley (Guy Madison) to set him up for a 'robbery' so she can collect the inheritance of her father. Daley, somehow, gets away from the coppers (wink wink) and finds his wife, who set him up, and takes over her business. She tries to get it back from him by scheming etc., but ends up loving the abuse (because women love to be dominated, you know? especially by people they themselves set up to take the fall for crimes they commit -- see the 'convoluted trite' aspect?) and they live happily ever after.