King of the Khyber Rifles (1953)

A half-caste British officer in 19th-century India battles the prejudices of both his Army colleagues and the local populace while trying to help put down a rebellion led by a greedy local ruler.

Director:

Henry King

Writers:

Ivan Goff (screenplay), Ben Roberts (screenplay)

Stars:

Tyrone Power, Terry Moore, Michael Rennie

1 nomination.

Cast

Cast overview:
Tyrone Power	...	Capt. Alan King
Terry Moore	...	Susan Maitland
Michael Rennie	...	Brig. Gen. J. R. Maitland
John Justin	...	Lt. Geoffrey Heath
Guy Rolfe	...	Karram Khan
Richard Wyler	...	Lt. Ben Baird (as Richard Stapley)
Murray Matheson	...	Maj. Ian MacAllister
Frank DeKova	...	Ali Nur (as Frank de Kova)
Argentina Brunetti	...	Lali
Sujata Rubener	...	Native Dancer (as Sujata)

Storyline

Freshly arrived Sandhurst-trained Captain Alan King, better versed in Pashtun then any of the veterans and born locally as army brat, survives an attack on his escort to his Northwest Frontier province garrison near the Khyber pass because of Ahmed, a native Afridi deserter from the Muslim fanatic rebel Karram Khan's forces. As soon as his fellow officers learn his mother was a native Muslim which got his parents disowned even by their own families, he falls prey to stubborn prejudiced discrimination, Lieutenant Geoffrey Heath even moves out of their quarters, except from half-Irish Lt. Ben Baird. Brigadier general J. R. Maitland, whose policy is full equality among whites, learns King knew Kurrum Khan as a boy and charges him with training and commanding native cavalry, which comes along fine. The general's egalitarian daughter Susan Maitland takes a fancy to King, even falls in love but the general decides to send her safely home to England after a kidnapped attempt when King saved ...

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Plot Keywords:

rifleman | general | muslim | india | battle | 

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Taglines:

You See It Without Glasses in CinemaScope

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Genres:

Adventure | Drama | History | Romance

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Certificate:

Approved

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

19 March 1954 (Sweden)

Also Known As:

Capitaine King

Filming Locations:

Alabama Hills, Lone Pine, California, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$2,190,000 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Twentieth Century Fox

Technical Specs

Runtime:

100 min

Sound Mix:

4-Track Stereo (Western Electric Recording)

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.55 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

This was Twentieth Century-Fox's fourth CinemaScope production.

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Goofs

Captain King's pocket watch contains photographic images of his parents (~12:00) which must predate their stated 1833 date of death. The earliest known photograph of a person by Daguerre is from 1838 and were all exposed onto metallic silver plates.

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Quotes

Karram Khan: You see Alan, even I am not wholly without a conscience. Last night you spared my life. Now I return the gesture. You will be returned safely to Peshawar. But we'll meet again and when we do there will be no hesitation. I will cut you out of my path as I would a weed. The scales are balanced now. There is no past.

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Connections

Edited into The Time Tunnel: Night of the Long Knives (1966)

User Reviews

Not available on video!?! Pourquoi pas?

Quite a few of those machine-tooled early CinemaScope productions from Twentieth Century Fox seem to be consigned to the dustbins of the memories of those of us who had the good fortune to see them in their full widescreen ratio with a magnetic stereophonic soundtrack during their initial release.

This one, directed with unusual energy by that Hollywood veteran, Henry King; lensed by that master of the color cameras, Leon Shamroy; and graced with a suitably sweeping score by Bernard Herrmann, looks like its lost in the archives where, let us hope, the master negative survives until the day that keepers of the Twentieth vaults come to their senses and favor us with a DVD release in the original (not reduced to anything less, please!) widescreen anamorphic format.

Terry Moore, who enjoyed a brief run as one of Fox's oft-used ingenues (and ladies of somewhat easier virtue, as in "Peyton Place") did seem a bit miscast, but Tyrone Power, Michael Rennie and well-chosen supporting players outshone her shortcomings. I recall that TIME magazine gave this quite a positive review and I remember that its use of mountainous California locations were quite convincing as a substitute for sending a company (or just a second unit) all the way to India's probably less hospitable subcontinent.