Paul Newman appeared in quite a few Western films, and here he stars as the white man John Russell, who was captured and raised by the Apache tribe.
He returns briefly to “white civilisation” after inheriting a boarding house from the man who rescued him as a teenager. Unwilling to adapt to white society, Russell trades the boarding house for horses and heads back to the reservation.
Russell boards a stagecoach to Bisbee, sharing the ride with a fiery boarding house manager named Jessie (Diane Cilento), a corrupt former Indian Affairs bureaucrat named Dr Alexander Favor (Fredric March) and his snobbish wife Audra (Barbara Rush).
Upon learning of Russell’s Native American upbringing, the passengers treat him with open bigotry and force him to ride outside on top of the stagecoach with the driver.
Cicero Grimes (Richard Boone) and his gang of outlaws ambush the stagecoach, targeting Dr Favor, who is carrying a fortune in stolen federal funds originally meant to buy food for starving Apaches on the reservation.
The outlaws rob the passengers and kidnap Audra Favor, leaving the rest stranded in the brutal desert heat.
The very passengers who despised Russell are forced to rely entirely on his superior survival instincts, combat skills, and quiet pragmatism.
Russell reclaims the stolen cash but faces a profound philosophical dilemma – does he risk his life for an entitled group of people who treated him with hatred, or abandon them to the desert?
Ultimately, Russell chooses a path of moral integrity and confronts the gang at an abandoned mine, resulting in a violent shootout where he kills Grimes but is fatally shot while successfully rescuing the hostage.
The film was a critical and commercial success, grossing $12 million at the box office against a $5.9 million production budget.
John Russell
Paul Newman Dr. Alex Favor
Fredric March Cicero Grimes
Richard Boone Jessie Brown
Diane Cilento Frank Braden
Cameron Mitchell Audra Favor
Barbara Rush Billy Lee Blake
Peter Lazer Doris Blake
Margaret Blye Henry Mendez
Martin Balsam Steve Early
Skip Ward Mexican Bandit
Frank Silvera Lamar Dean
David Canary Delgado
Val Avery Soldier
Larry Ward
Anzio (1968) In 1944, the Allied forces land unopposed at Anzio - behind the German lines on the…
Last Tycoon, The (1976) This unloved film from a late-career Elia Kazan is about a young movie producer making his…
Undertaker and His Pals, The (1966) "A macabre story of two motorcycle-riding, knife-wielding, shiv-shaving, eye-gouging, arm-twisting, chain-lashing, scalpel-flashing, acid-throwing, gun-shooting, bone-breaking, pathological…
Wild Ride, The (1960) In one of Jack Nicholson's earliest films, the future superstar plays homicidal hot-rodder Johnny Varron who…
Our Man Flint (1965) "He makes love in 47 languages." The box-office success of Ian Fleming's 007 led to a…
Westward the Women (1951) It is 1850. 140 women are bound from Independence, Missouri, for a West Coast valley ranch…
Hatari! (1962) What director Howard Hawks did for South American mail plane pilots in 1939's Only Angels Have Wings,…
Russell boards a stagecoach to Bisbee, sharing the ride with a fiery boarding house manager named Jessie (Diane Cilento), a corrupt former Indian Affairs bureaucrat named Dr Alexander Favor (Fredric March) and his snobbish wife Audra (Barbara Rush).
The outlaws rob the passengers and kidnap Audra Favor, leaving the rest stranded in the brutal desert heat.
The film was a critical and commercial success, grossing $12 million at the box office against a $5.9 million production budget.
Cicero Grimes
Henry Mendez
