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Standard central casting Indians
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The story of the Seminoles is a very interesting one. Related to the Creek, they became increasingly independent of that people, establishing their own cultural and linguistic identity in Florida. In the eighteenth century the tribe was augmented by free and escaped black people. Indeed, the word Seminole is a corruption of cimarrón, Spanish term for ‘runaway’ or ‘wild one’.
When the now independent United States acquired Florida from Spain in 1819, its settlers increased pressure on Seminole lands. During the period of the Seminole Wars (1818–1858), the tribe was first confined to a large reservation in the center of the Florida peninsula by the Treaty of Moultrie Creek (1823) and then evicted from the territory altogether under the Treaty of Payne’s Landing (1832). By 1842, to the lasting shame of the US, most Seminoles had been uprooted and forced to move to poor land in Indian Territory, west of the Mississippi River.
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Seminoles
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During the Civil War, most of the Oklahoma Seminole allied with the Confederacy, after which they had to sign a new treaty, including freedom and tribal membership for the Black Seminole.
Perhaps fewer than 200 Seminoles remained in Florida after the Third Seminole War (1855-1858), but they fostered a resurgence in traditional customs and a culture of staunch independence. In the late nineteenth century, the Florida Seminole re-established limited relations with the US government and in 1930 received 5,000 acres (c 20 sq km) of reservation lands.
In the early 1950s, Hollywood, tired perhaps of traditional non-specific ‘Indians’ in standard attire from central casting’s costume department, suddenly developed an interest in the Seminoles, and Westerns started to appear featuring them. Or rather, Hollywood rediscovered an interest, for there had been silent movies about the people, such as The Seminole’s Trust (1910), The Seminole’s Sacrifice (1911) and The Virgin of Seminole (1923).
There were three mainstream full-budget films about the whites’ wars against the Seminoles, all historical bunkum. They were Warners’ Distant Drums in 1951, Universal’s Seminole in 1953 and Columbia’s Seminole Uprising in 1955. The first was directed by Raoul Walsh, written by Niven Busch and starred Gary Cooper,so it ought to have been the best, but it was a farrago, a typical stodgy Warners early-50s dud. The second, helmed by Budd Boetticher and starring Rock Hudson, was probably the best, though hardly great art. The last was a poorly cobbled-together oater with George Montgomery in the lead, and directed by Rin Tin Tin helmsman, the uninspired Earl Bellamy, and it is that one we are going to talk about today (sorry about the overlong intro).
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The middle one was about the best, but…
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The first thing you notice about Seminole Uprising is that it is two films crudely stitched together and presented as one. Mostly shot on the Corrigan and Iverson ranches in California in quite pastel colors, Columbia then intercut footage of what looks like Arizona locations from some older movie, with a very different film stock, colored garishly. It becomes laughable when the bluecoats are holed up in gray Californian rocks surrounded by green hills and trees, firing at their Seminole enemies in an orange desert landscape a hundred yards away. And it’s supposed to be Texas. Why? The editing (Jerome Thoms) and continuity are absolutely dire. The DP was Henry Freulich, who worked on a long line of Columbia low- and mid-budget Westerns from 1948 on, including George Montgomery ones.
Then, while the other movies made some attempt to dress the Seminole in their traditional and colorful costumes, very different from Plains Indians or Apaches (Anthony Quinn was very dashing as Osceola in Seminole), in Seminole Uprising the Seminoles look like Cheyennes, with fringed buckskins and war bonnets, perhaps in order that the old film stock could be used. They aren’t Seminoles at all.
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Anthony Quinn as Seminole chief in Seminole
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Steve Ritch as Seminole chief in Seminole Uprising
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We open the story with brave Lieutenant Cam Elliott (George Montgomery) reporting to Colonel Robert E Lee (Richard H Cutting, in many a Western from 1953 on) at Fort Mason in 1855. Lee tells Lt. Elliott that he, Elliott, grew up with Seminole chief Black Cat, a fact Elliott was presumably already aware of. In fact, everyone says that both Elliott and Black Cat are of mixed race, half-breeds as they are called, though later in the movie Mr Cat denies this, declaring that as a child Elliott had been found by the Seminole in a wagon train. This of course clears the way for Montgomery to marry the heroine, the colonel’s daughter (Karin Booth) for the very idea of the blonde maid wedding a half-breed would deeply shock the sensitivities of 50s Hollywood – that dreaded miscegenation they went on about. I mean, think of the children!
Anyway, Elliott is sent to the Puertocitas Mountains to track down Black Cat (Steven Ritch, who though not exactly of Native American heritage – he was from Rhode Island – made quite a thing of playing Indians in Westerns) and get him “back on the reservation,” though which reservation, where, is not stated.
So off George rides, accompanied by his crusty old sidekick Cubby, a sort of Gabby Hayes/Walter Brennan part, though played straighter and less for old-timery humor. As George is an Army officer, sidekick Cubby is a civilian scout. Cubby was played by William Fawcett, a PhD and former professor, not the most common background for old-timer sidekicks in Westerns but well, why not? Fawcett was in literally hundreds (nearly 400) big-screen and TV oaters and was always rather professional in them. He’s a cut above the usual comic sidekick.
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William Fawcett, PhD, is sidekick/scout
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The colonel’s daughter (I should have said, the colonel is played by B-movie actor and serial bridegroom Howard Wright, bit parts in most Western TV shows) is a dumb blonde. It wouldn’t be PC to call anyone that now but this was 1955 and she, Susan, is doll-like, over made up and plain silly. And rather wet. She gets herself kidnapped by Black Cat, which helps the Hollywood plot but is otherwise all rather tiresome. Ms Booth (five oaters and a couple of TV ones) isn’t a very good actress and the part she is given is lamely written, so all in all it doesn’t work out too well.
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Unluckily for him, he finally gets the gal
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The screenplay, by the way, is by Robert E Kent (28 Westerns, later a peoducer) from a Curt Brandon novel, and it’s clunky and ponderous.
Susan used to be in love with George, and still flirts with him though engaged to rotter/cad Capt. Dudley (Ed Hinton). We immediately know that Capt. Dudley will be killed and Susan will go off with our hero, and this duly occurs in the last reel, about the last 30 seconds in fact.
This film really isn’t very good. Montgomery did some reasonably good oaters for Columbia. But this isn’t one of them.
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One Response
The best asset of Seminole Uprising which is full of weaknesses but I would be less severe than Jeff about it, is surely William Fawcett who reminded me more John McIntire than Brennan/Hayes. The villainous officer seems a villainous actor as well… Besides, the film includes many classic cavalry western subplots such as the girl at the fort balancing between two men.
What Jeff is saying of director Earl Bellamy in his text about The Toughest Gun in Tombstone where he is pictured receiving his well-merited Golden Boot Award :
“My Lord Bellamy (though I don’t think he was that kind of earl) was a TV man really. In fact he had the honor of directing more than 1,600 TV episodes, including examples of pretty well every Western TV show you care to name, but he also did the occasional feature Western, starting as 2nd Unit Director on Arizona in 1940 (so he was coming back in this one), and Seminole Uprising in ’55 was his first in the chair. He helmed Black Jack Ketchum, Desperado in 1956 [starring Howard Duff and Victor Jory]. Later, after Toughest Gun, he would helm the 1966 Audie [last] oater Gunpoint, among others.”
He also directed:
– Against a Crooked Sky (1975) starring Richard Boone (by the way does anyone remember Jeff’s text about Boone, one of his most cherished actors, and his films !? An other one probably lost in the internet limbos…)
– Seven Alone (1974) with Dewey Martin (Strangely Jeff did not write anything about it in spite of Seven in its title…)
– Incident at Phantom Hill (1966), with Robert Fuller, Dan Duryea, Claude Akins, Noah Beery Jr., Paul Fix and Denver Pyle…!
– Stagecoach to Dancers’ Rock (1962) with Martin Landau
These 4 films are not found in Jeff’s index unfortunately…
Jeff seems not to have written about George Montgomery but in the chat below Toughest Gun. Walter S. says (in 2019):
“Jeff, another fine write-up of a really good George Montgomery Western. I’ve said it many times, but you can’t go wrong with Montgomery in a good Western role. He looked good, sounded good, and was a good rider.
George Montgomery was so much more than a good actor. He was, hands down a renaissance man. He was a director, writer, producer, artist, sculptor, architect, and furniture maker. George designed homes and made furniture for many of the notables of Hollywood before he began painting and making bronze sculptures. His sculptures were reminiscent of Frederic Remington. He made bronze sculptures of many of the stars of the day including Ronald Reagan, Clint Eastwood, and John Wayne. If my memory serves me right, at the AN ALL-STAR TRIBUTE TO JOHN WAYNE, which aired on TV November 26, 1976, Wayne was presented with the bronze sculpture that George did of him. George was in attendance at the event.”
Jeff was answering:
“Yes, and I am aiming to write about George when I have reviewed all his Westerns individually.”
Jeff
I did not check if Jeff has reviewed all of them…