Santa Fe Trail (1940)

Errol, Ronnie and Olivia, directed by Curtiz. This is based around the story of one Jeb Stuart, a Southern born gent who would go on to become one of the South's greatest cavalrymen during the American Civil War. We follow his romance with sweetheart Kit Carson Holliday, his friendship with George Armstrong Custer, and onto his battles with abolitionist John Brown. Though it's mostly agreed these days that Santa Fe Trail has no great historical worth, it is however still a decent movie that boasts great drama, a sweet romance, and no little amount of action. Knowingly directed by the astute Michael Curtiz and featuring the acting of Errol Flynn (dashing as Stuart), Olivia de Havilland (gutsy as Carson), Ronald Reagan (solid as Custer), and Raymond Massey (acting overdrive as Brown), the picture certainly holds up well on the technical front. However, the relatively low rating on internet movie sites is of much interest to me, for being as I'm British I have no sort of conflict of interest with the actual story. Patriotic fervour booms out from the screen, but this appears to be at odds with the John Brown arc, the character's ambitions are nearly accepted as noble, creating a sort of odd coupling. I could of course be way off, but I wonder if the story doesn't sit well with some of our American friends?. Still the picture is never less than enjoyable, the great music from Max Steiner adds to the occasion and the finale is high reward for the viewers patience. 6.5/10

First thing to do before you watch this star-studded tale, is to forget anything you might actually know about the history of the start of the US Civil war - that way, you can sit back and enjoy this adventure film in the spirit Mike Curtiz intended. Errol Flynn is Jeb Stewart and Ronnie Reagan is George Custer who both pass out from West Point and are assigned the difficult task of helping to thwart the gun-runners and insurrectionists led by Raymond Massey as "John Brown" who is determined to assert his rather racially enlightened strategy to free all the slaves in the United States, and no talking about it. There's a bit of a love story between Flynn and a very tomboyish looking Olivia de Havilland ("Kit"); a bit of subterfuge from Van Heflin as "Rader"; some strong support from Alan Hale and a few good cameos from Ward Bond and Charles "Ming" Middleton but this rather episodic acton move belongs entirely to the Rasputin-esque Massey - to, more specifically to his eyes; those of a despotic maniac that even though his goals are laudable, make you mistrust everything about him. He is great. The narrative mixes fact and fiction as you might mix a cocktail, and like a cocktail sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't - but it's a decently paced yarn with a bit of a conscience and a flourishing ending that is still worth catching up with today.