SERIOUSLY. This is what the crap Hollywood still puts out?

Self-important, over-dramatic, uninspired.

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

I didn’t really have many expectations going into the movie (good or bad), but I actually really enjoyed it. I really liked the characters and the banter between them.

I am not that bothered by historical facts when all I need is a good Western to relax with. And this fits the bill perfectly. If I wanted historical accuracy I would go over to the History Channel and then I Would have to think and not be able to relax.Perfect scenery, magnificently depicted Indian camp, great horse riding, good acting all round, even the self critical Mr Lund was perfect for his role.Westerns of today just do not have the old magic.Just as an incidental rider: when as a boy in the Saturday matinée Our gang would always cheer the Calvary, now I have grown up the Indians have my cheers and sympathy. What was done to them will forever be a massive blot on the history of the USA.

This is a truly epic Western - epic in the moral sense: It operates as a great ceremony, a funeral ode for a great people, and the Homeric nobility of their doomed warrior heroes. The whole film sweeps majestically along with the native Americans to the bitter end of their doomed civilisation, and all the distracting side-plots are merely adumbrated at the margins of the action. The U.S. Cavalry, too, is given its due meed of admiration for the honest professionalism of its best soldiers, and the finest representatives of its military tradition. In this, Webb's film is reminiscent of a John Ford Cavalry Western. But it has something else: The awareness of a 'great game' - almost in the sense this term was applied by the English to their Imperial adventure – being played out with mutual honour and respect, even admiration and fondness, between the great rivals for possession of an entire Continent.This is a truly great film, unblemished by the jittery special pleading of Hollywood that bespeaks the unacknowledged guilt of the American White Man. This is a sincere film - not a film of gestures: It is, as I began by saying, a grand Ceremony. And in the Ceremony is the aching sense of the loss of a Great Game which conferred greatness upon all who were brave enough to participate on equal terms.

In 1877 Wyoming, a government worker helps the United States Calvary in their quest to move the Cheyenne Indian tribe from the north-end of the state to the south; the Indian Chief--concerned about being on the losing end of an impending battle--agrees, but two young warriors oppose the move. Dusty western with a passive, sensitive side. The performances are variable, with Robert Wagner looking constipated (as usual), but Jeffrey Hunter doing a surprisingly forceful job as mercurial Little Dog (Hunter's scene amiably tossing knives with Wagner has a spirit that the rest of the film lacks); elsewhere, Debra Paget plays a lovestruck squaw (she's the palest-skinned Cheyenne ever to grace the screen!) and John Lund is a block of wood as a Colonel. The events depicted are allegedly based on fact, though one guesses this tenuous screenplay by Delmer Daves (of all people) and Leo Townsend runs far smoother than actual history might suggest. The "white feather" is the Indian's challenge to the white man, but it seems to me the horses involved get a far rougher treatment than either. ** from ****

I used to see most westerns in the fifties, but for some reason I was unable to see "White Feather". I kept reading reviews about it, though, and basically all of them said the film was good, nothing great, but good. I thought it would be a type of "Broken Arrow" with some variations, so did not go out of my way to see it. Finally I saw it and was enthusiastic about it. No film has shown the agony of Indians which have to move from their land in such a sensitive way. Jeffrey Hunter was a great actor and he proves it in his magnificent performance of Little Dog. The romance between Robert Wagner and Debra Paget makes most of the other films that show the same, pale. But the greatness of the film comes with the last part where Cinemascope has never been better used to show at the same time the army and the Indians and the unexpected final developments. This film did not have James Stewart as an actor, but Robert Wagner did just as well, neither was Anthony Mann or Delmer Daves (who co-wrote the script) the director, but Robert D. Webb did a great job. Don't miss this film, it is one of the all time great westerns.