Apache Woman (ARC, 1955)

She’s only half-Apache though

Corman (born 1926 and still going strong, as far as I know), pictured left, is, as you will probably know, an interesting chap who studied engineering, didn’t like it, did a term at Oxford University in England studying English literature, bummed around Europe for a bit, returned to the US, and started writing screenplays. He scraped together what money he could and set up as a producer, and in 1954 had a little success with The Fast and the Furious. He used that to put together a deal with the fledgling American Releasing Corporation, which soon became American-International Pictures, with Corman as the company’s prime asset. It would become one of the most commercially successful independent studios there was. Later he would go on to more ambitious projects but in the mid-50s it was a case of stretching modest resources as far as they would go (he famously shot The Little Shop of Horrors in two days and a night).

Westerns were never a huge part of his output but he was involved in one capacity or another with eleven, starting as a script consultant (uncredited) on the fine film The Gunfighter in 1950. Five Guns West in 1955 was his first oater as director and producer, and Apache Woman later the same year was his second. The following year he would helm the hilariously bad but weirdly watchable Gunslinger.

Apache Woman, despite its title, had Lloyd Bridges (right, in High Noon) as its headline star. I’ve always been a bit of a Lloyd admirer (I was a huge fan of Sea Hunt as a ten-year old boy) and I think that in Westerns he was a quality actor. He is credited with appearances in 28 feature Westerns, starting with small roles in Bill Elliott and Charles Starrett oaters in the early 1940s. He got second-billing to Tex Ritter in North of the Rockies in 1942 (wherever that may be) and in 1950 he got to play the bad guy opposite Randolph Scott in Colt .45. He finally topped the billing in Lippert’s Little Big Horn (1951), in which I thought he was excellent (it’s actually a good little film) but of course he became famous as Deputy  Harvey Pell in High Noon, where he showed just what a good Western actor he was. Last of the Comanches with Broderick Crawford and City of Bad Men with Dale Robertson followed, both in ’53, then he was one of Ben Thompson’s sidekicks (with Jack Elam) in Wichita with Joel McCrea, just before Apache Woman. These were sometimes quite big parts in pictures by major studios (Fox, Columbia, etc), so I’m not quite sure why he did such a ‘minor’ project as Apache Woman, but still. The whole movie was only budgeted at $80,000, so I don’t think he can have got much. I guess you take work where you can get it. Anyway, he always brought quality to a Western. He plays a reasonably pro-Indian government agent trying to unmask a plot to inculpate Apaches for crimes they did not commit.

The central character of Apache Woman, though, the title role, was Anne LeBeau, played by Joan Taylor (Chuck’s recurrent love interest in The Rifleman and a Western regular, from Fighting Man of the Plains in 1949 to War Drums in 1957). Actually, it’s a bit of a cheat because she is a ‘half-breed’, not a full Apache woman at all. She and her Milton-reading brother Armand (Lance Fuller, Colorados in Cattle Queen of Montana the year before) are living together in an intermediate world in which they are scorned by the Apaches as white but held in contempt by the whites as Indian. In fact the opening words are Anne shouting at a tormentor (Jonathan Haze) “Don’t call me squaw!”

I should think not, indeed. It is not clear when the term squaw became so pejorative. It seems to have entered the English language early (Webster’s says the first recorded use was 1622) as squa, in Massachusetts. Certainly by the turn of the twentieth century it was already demeaning. A squaw man was an object of opprobrium (though the 1905 play The Squaw Man and its several subsequent silent movie adaptations portrayed the Indian wife concerned as noble). At any rate, by 1955 squaw was a term of abuse, and offensive usage.

Actually, in as far as such a modest picture allowed, the Lou Rusoff script does have something interesting to say about the plight of mixed-race people in late nineteenth century America. The basic idea is that Anne will resist but will finally turn towards the white side, encouraged by an amorous Lloyd Bridges, and be integrated into society, while Armand will go full-on Apache and fight. “This was the first time I tried to deal with the subject of racial prejudice within the framework of a commercial movie,” recalled Corman.

The movie is not that pro-Indian, though. It is quite clear that Anne is doing the right thing, while Armand must perish in the last reel because he has transgressed against ‘civilization’. Rusoff wasn’t a Western specialist: this, Flesh and the Spur and another Corman picture, The Oklahoma Woman, were his only essays in the genre. But he does seem to have come up with something at least moderately original.

The townsfolk (X-Brands is listed as one but I didn’t spot him) are convinced that the Apaches are on the warpath. And Sheriff Paul Birch is inclined to agree with ‘em. There have been seven killings in the last three months, and some stage hold-ups too. Rex Moffett (Bridges) has been
sent by the Governor, instead of soldiers, and he is not at all sure that the Apaches are responsible. Their chief, White Star (Gene Marlowe) seems a statesmanlike sort of chap. His English grammar is rather polished too. “I would rather you did not,” he says. Must have been to school back East, I reckon. No, it can’t be White Star doing the marauding. There’s definitely some skullduggery afoot.

Light relief is provided by old silent-movie comic Chester Conklin as the town’s buffoon. Corman regular Dick Miller plays both a cowboy and an Indian (on one salary, probably).

Lloyd surprises Anne as she bathes in a desert pool (how many times have we seen that?) and seems reluctant to leave so that she may exit the water, but is finally constrained at least to turn his back. Rex is drawn to Anne but he has a rival in the shape of local rancher Macy (Morgan Jones). Who will win her hand? Do you need to ask? Anyway, it turns out that Macy is a bad egg.

Rex decides to flush out the bad guys by spreading word that $40,000 is going to be transported along a certain route. He and his men watch over the consignment. They are sure the bad guys will go for it.

There’s a sub-Winchester ’73 final fight in the rocks, and either Rex or Armand will fall to his death but my lips are sealed as to which (as if you couldn’t guess).

There are classic Corriganville and Iverson Ranch locations. The picture was shot in Pathécolor, now very washed-out, by Floyd Crosby, no less. It’s quite often seen in b&w, however.

In all honesty, my dears, it’s all pretty standard stuff. But there is the odd glimmer of interest here and there. You will not pine if you never see this Western before you die. But if it comes on TV or something, you could give it a go. Lloyd is always worth watching.