| Broken Arrow | |
|---|---|
 Theatrical release poster | |
| Directed by | Delmer Daves |
| Screenplay by | Albert Maltz |
| Based on | Blood Brother byElliott Arnold |
| Produced by | Julian Blaustein |
| Starring | |
| Cinematography | Ernest Palmer |
| Edited by | J. Watson Webb Jr. |
| Music by | Hugo Friedhofer |
| Color process | Technicolor |
Production company | 20th Century Fox |
| Distributed by | 20th Century Fox |
Release date |
|
Running time | 93 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Box office | $3.6 million (US rentals)[1] |
Broken Arrow is a 1950 Americanindependentrevisionist Westerndrama film directed byDelmer Daves and starringJames Stewart,Jeff Chandler andDebra Paget. The film is based on historical figures but fictionalizes their story in dramatized form. It was nominated for threeAcademy Awards and won aGolden Globe Award for Best Film Promoting International Understanding. Film historians have said that the film was one of the first majorWesterns toportray Native American sympathetically.[2]
Tom Jeffords finds a wounded 14-year-oldApache boy dying frombuckshot wounds in his back. The boy first tries to attack him, but Jeffords gives him water and treats his wounds, staying with him until he heals. The boy's tribesmen appear and are initially hostile but free Jeffords after the boy convinces them that he is a good man who helped him. However, when a group of gold prospectors approaches, the Apaches gag Jeffords and tie him to a tree. He watches helplessly as they attack the prospectors and torture the survivors. The warriors warn him not to enter Apache territory again.
When Jeffords returns toTucson, he encounters a prospector who escaped the ambush. He corrects a man's exaggerated account of the attack, but Ben Slade does not understand why Jeffords did not kill the Apache boy. Jeffords replies by defending his choice.
Jeffords declines the army's request to scout Apache territory and instead learns theApache language and customs from an Indian guide who lives among the townspeople. He plans to approachthe Apache leader Cochise's stronghold on behalf of his friend Milt, who is in charge of the mail service in Tucson. The mail has not been reaching its destinations because of Apache raids, and Jeffords believes that the discussion may be a starting point for a peace treaty. He enters the Apache stronghold and talks with Cochise, who agrees to let the mail couriers through. The men realize that their underlying morality is similar, and Cochise is impressed with Jeffords' bravery and willingness to learn his language. Jeffords meets and falls in love with a young Apache woman named Sonseeahray.
Despite the agreement, Apaches attack an army wagon train and kill the survivors. The townsfolk try to lynch Jeffords as a traitor for working with their enemies before he is saved by principled generalOliver Otis Howard, who recruits him to negotiate a wider peace treaty with Cochise. They devise a peace treaty with Cochise, but a group led byGeronimo oppose it and leave the stronghold. When the renegades ambush a stagecoach, Jeffords seeks help from Cochise, and the stagecoach is saved with the Apaches' help.
Jeffords and Sonseeahray marry in an Apache ceremony. Slade's son visits Jeffords and Cochise to inform them about two of his horses stolen by Cochise's people. Cochise doubts his story, as he knows that Slade hates the Apaches. They accompany the boy up the canyon and are ambushed by Slade and a gang of men from Tucson. Jeffords is shot and badly wounded and Sonseeahray is shot and killed, but Cochise kills most of the men, including Slade. Cochise forbids Jeffords to retaliate, arguing that peace must be maintained. General Howard arrives with some of the townsfolk and informs Jeffords and Cochise that the men who survived the ambush and fled have been captured and will be executed for their crime. The townsfolk offer their condolences and apologize.
Jeffords rides off with the belief that the death of Sonseeahray ensured a lasting peace and that she will always be with him.
Producer Julian Blaustein recalled: "We had a terrible time locating an actor with the proper voice and stature to playCochise. Before we found Chandler we were even consideringEzio Pinza".[3]
Jeff Chandler was cast in May 1949 on the basis of his performance inSword in the Desert. He was working in several radio series at the time,Michael Shayne andOur Miss Brooks, which he left for several weeks.[4]
Filming started on June 6, 1949. It was primarily shot on location in northernArizona, approximately 30 miles south ofFlagstaff. Apaches from the Whiteriver agency on theFort Apache Indian Reservation played themselves.[5]Debra Paget was only 16 years old when she played the love interest to 42-year-oldJames Stewart. CanadianMohawk actorJay Silverheels portrayedGeronimo.
The film is based on the 558-page novelBlood Brother (1947) byElliott Arnold.[citation needed]
Although manyWestern films of the pre-World War II period portray American Indians as unwaveringly hostile to the mostly European-American settlers, others showed them in a more positive light.Broken Arrow is noteworthy as one of the first post-war Westerns to present a more balanced portrayal of Indians, helping to bring the era of the revisionist Western genre.[6]
Broken Arrow was screened for 450 civic leaders at theMuseum of Modern Art in New York on July 13, 1950. The president of theAssociation on American Indian Affairs addressed the crowd to decry Hollywood's traditional portrayal of Indians and condemn the recent 14-year prison sentence given to fourNez Perce andCoeur d'Alene boys in Idaho for the theft of a sheep.[7][8]
In a contemporary review forThe New York Times, criticBosley Crowther wrote:
In what appears an honorable endeavor to clear the public's mind of the traditional notion that the American Indian was an unprincipled and uncivilized brute, Twentieth Century-Fox has manufactured a richly colorful romantic film, "Broken Arrow," in which the Indians come off better—much better—on the whole, than do the whites. As a matter of fact, one might wonder ... whether it isn't the white man, not the Indian, who should be regarded as "good" only when he is dead. ... We wish we could tell you unreservedly that the thesis is eloquently conveyed and that this picture demonstrates with real conviction that the Indian has been cruelly maligned. But unfortunately the nobleness of purpose of Twentieth Century-Fox is more to be commended than the talent with which it has made this film. ... [A]pparently in his enthusiasm to treat the Indian with politeness and respect, Delmer Daves, the director, brought forth red men who act like denizens of the musical comedy stage. ... No, we cannot accept this picture as either an exciting or reasonable account of the attitudes and ways of American Indians. They merit justice, but not such patronage."[9]
| Award | Category | Nominee(s) | Result | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Academy Awards | Best Supporting Actor | Jeff Chandler | Nominated | [10] |
| Best Screenplay | Albert Maltz[a] | Nominated | ||
| Best Cinematography – Color | Ernest Palmer | Nominated | ||
| Golden Globe Awards | Best Cinematography – Color | Nominated | [11] | |
| Best Promoting International Understanding | Delmer Daves | Won | ||
| Picturegoer Awards | Best Actor | Jeff Chandler | Nominated | |
| Writers Guild of America Awards | Best Written Film Concerning Problems with the American Scene | Albert Maltz[b] | Nominated | |
| Best Written American Western | Won |
The film was nominated by theAmerican Film Institute for inclusion in the 2008AFI's 10 Top 10 list of Western films.[12]
Authority control databases: National |
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