Too much of everything

When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

While it is a pity that the story wasn't told with more visual finesse, this is trivial compared to our real-world problems. It takes a good movie to put that into perspective.

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

MGM's "Ambush" - a forgotten above average fifties western - has finally turned up thanks to the Warner Bros. Archive label with their release of the picture in a fine DVD transfer that should now set it on the road to some sort of rediscovery. Produced for Metro in 1950 by Armand Deutsch it was directed with a modicum of flair by Sam Wood who himself was something of a stranger when it came to directing westerns. Forgetting his best forgotten 1940 B picture "Rangers Of Fortune" AMBUSH really would be the estimable director's first and, as it turned out, only venture into the genre. From a story by Luke Short it was nicely written for the screen by Marguerite Roberts and was superbly shot in Gallup, New Mexico in black & white by Harold Lipstein. And complimenting the film throughout is a rich score - featuring a spirited cavalry march - by Austrian composer Rudolph Kopp. AMBUSH also was the first "real" western the picture's star Robert Taylor would appear in, if you discount the lamentable and dull "Billy The Kid" which he ill-advisedly did in 1941. AMBUSH would now put the actor on the trail, so to speak, to make something of himself in westerns with the excellent "Devil's Doorway(1950), "Westward The Women" (1951), "Ride Vaquero" (1953) and "The Law & Jake Wade" (1958).Mescalero Apache leader Diablito (Charles Stephens) is on the warpath. He is raiding and killing whites all along the border. He also captures and enslaves white women. One such woman is Mary Carlyle (Marta Mitrovich) and it falls to the U.S. cavalry at the Fort Gambel outpost to rescue her. With the help of army scout Ward Kinsman (Robert Taylor) officer in charge Capt. Ben Lorrisonn (John Hodiak) leads a large contingent of troops into the hills to engage with and wipe out Diablito once and for all and retrieve the woman. But things don't go too well with internal bickering and disputes between the strait-laced and uncompromising Captain and Kinsman and between the Captain and the young Lt. Linus Delaney (Don Taylor) who is having an affair with an enlisted man's wife (Jean Hagan) back at the fort. They eventually encounter the Apaches and after Kinsman stampedes their horses and they are trapped in a canyon a fierce struggle ensues. Finally with most of the Apaches and troops wiped out (including Lorrison and Diablito) Kinsman does manage to rescue the woman.It is almost inconceivable that a western with the leading actor who was once named Spangler Arlington Brugh could for a moment be taken seriously. It must surely be a comedy you would ascertain. But you would be quite mistaken for this indeed was Robert Taylor's real name before he changed it and a blessing it is too that he did so. Watching him here in AMBUSH you would find it difficult to associate him with such a name since he turns in an excellent robust performance as the rough and tough army scout. Excellent too is the ill-fated John Hodiak, the likable Don Taylor and Charles Stephens as the fearsome Apache leader in a role he would play many times in westerns of the period. Interestingly Stephens in real life was the grandson of the famous Apache leader Geronimo.AMBUSH is a neat little western that is well paced well written well played and well directed by Sam Wood who unfortunately never lived to see the release of his finished movie. He died of heart failure soon after the film wrapped.Footnote: Sharp eyed western fans will notice Fort Gambel as the one and the same location as that for Fort Bravo in "Escape From Fort Bravo" three years later. Both were filmed at the Ray Corrigan Ranch in Simi Valley, California. Also in "Fort Bravo" Charles Stephens had a minor part as an Apache army scout.

I am of the opinion that "Ambush" comes off as a standard black and white horse opera for two reason. First off, as I was watching the film I couldn't help but wonder as to how much better of a film it could have been if it had been filmed in gorgeous Technocolor which would have emphasized the beautiful Monument Valley type of surroundings. Secondly, the film being a product of it's time (1949), was limited to the morality and the censorship that most assuredly was imposed on it. In other words, various organizations such as Catholic Legion Of Decency played a big part in what could be portrayed during the context of the film's plot and what was presented on the screen i.e., if any studio violated their code of ethics that appeared in the good old "Sunday Visitor", a Catholic publication, the Legion of Decency would give it a "C" for Condemned or a "MO" for Morally Objectionable to discourage patrons from going to theaters to see the film. The plot of this film has Lt. Linus Delaney (Don Taylor) falling for an enlisted man's wife Martha Conovan (Jean Hagen). The woman's husband Tom Conovan (Bruce Cowling) is an abusive drunk that continuously beats his wife and eventually becomes an army deserter. Rest assured that their is no hope for this star struck couple ever to find happiness! Obviously, there is only one way for a "taken" woman to get the other man....and that is for the out of luck husband or fiancé to die. Enter Captain Ben Lorrison (John Hodiak), a fool hardy Officer reminiscent of Henry Fonda in "Fort Apache". In other words, a man who will not listen to someone that has been there and knows what and when to do it as exemplified by a scout, Ward Kinsman (Robert Taylor). Taylor inadvertently falls for Hodiak's girl Ann Duverall (Arlene Dahl) but he has two things going for him that the other Taylor doesn't have; 1)Dahl is not married to Hodiak and 2)Hodiak is a prideful by the book officer and his stubbornness to attack the Indians when he has been heeded not to eventually gets him killed. Alas! Robert Taylor gets Dahl while Don Taylor and Jean Hagen sadly stare at each expressing a tearful, wordless "Goodbye" while humoring the good old Catholic Legion of Decency. I don't know about you guys out there...but I always looked at my good old Sunday Visitor to check out the movies I wanted to see, and I didn't let those darn old "Condemned" or "Morally Objectionable" get in my way of my entertainment.

Robert Taylor was always the most amazing looking man in a western. He sat a horse like no one else in movies ever did or has since. This is a truly good western about an Indian scout, Ward Kinsman, played by Taylor. He is pursued by the army to scout a journey to find the sister of Ann Duverall (Arlene Dahl)who has been kidnapped by a renegade Apache. At first he says no, but is attracted to Dahl, and alienates her from her romantic Army Captain, Ben Lorrison, played by John Hodiak, who co-stared with Taylor on several occasions, including the Bribe. The other romances are center stage with a young Don Taylor pursuing the wife of an enlisted man who is an wife beater. Jean Hagen plays the wife with great apprehension, knowing she is love with Don Taylor but staying because it is her religion. None of the romance can however outshine the great outdoors, the Indian fights, the bravery of the soldiers, and Robert Taylor, who when he starts the film, is unshaven, dirty and just as real as I am sure Luke Short wrote the part. A wonderful western with all the elements of gritty realism of the book. A must see.

Story involves the Army's rescue of a General's daughter, captured by the Apaches when the surveying team she was with, was wiped out by a war party. Ward Kinsman (Robert Taylor), a former Army scout now gold prospector, is called upon by local Army commander (Leon Ames) to save her.Arlene Dahl is her worried sister who (as we guessed) falls in love with Taylor. Of course there's a love triangle between those two and Army Capt. Ben Lorrison (John Hodiak) to make this film more steamy than necessary. And of course Robert Taylor reluctantly agrees to help find the woman since he is falling in love with Dahl and really can't refuse her.What complicates things even further is another love triangle between Lt. Delaney (Don Taylor), Jean Hagen and her no-good enlisted husband played by Bruce Cowling. I guess director Sam Wood didn't think ONE steamy love triangle was enough so he had to have two. It's too bad all this nonsense chews up too much of the film because this oater had a lot of potential.What saves this from being a total soap opera is the decent battle scenes at the end of the film. The Calvary knows where the Apaches are massing and ambush them inside a canyon. The second ambush involves those Apaches who have escaped this first battle, led by their chief Diablito (Charles Stevens), who hide in holes on the vast plain and ambush John Hodiak's patrol. They hide in their covered holes and wait until they are on top of them.All but the master Sgt. Mack (Pat Moriarity) are killed in the ensuing gun battle, thereby freeing Robert Taylor to hook up with Dahl, and Don Taylor to hook up with the now widowed Hagen. No more Hodiak. No more Cowling. A little too convenient, I think.And all this lovey-dovey stuff brings what would otherwise have been an exciting western, down a couple of notches. So I'm gonna only give it a 5 out of 10 for complicating things more than need be.