La última orden

Forget any adherence to historical facts, directed by Frank Lloyd and with a Warren Duff screenplay, The Last Command is a slow moving piece that uses Jim Bowie as its focal point. Starring Sterling Hayden (Bowie), Richard Carlson (William Travers), Arthur Hunnicutt (Davy Crockett), Ernest Borgnine (Mike Radin), J. Carrol Naish (Santa Ana), and Anna Maria Alberghetti (Consuela), the piece was a project long courted by John Wayne. However, Republic refused to sanction the type of budget the Duke wanted for his vision. So after offering him a nominal fee for a part, he refused and Republic promptly went on to make the film anyway. The final result is an interesting film that finally pays off for those having the patience and tolerance for patriotic flag waving.

The story follows the battle of the Alamo in San Antonio in 1836, where brave Texans gave their life to become free of the Mexican rule, by defending the former mission station against overwhelming odds as the Mexican army of Santa Ana closed in for victory. The final battle is very well staged by Lloyd, and the acting, though not making the earth move, is very competent, particularly Hayden who does a nice line in tortured ruggedness. Max Steiner provides a zippy score and the low budget use of Trucolor doesn't affect the work of cinematographer Jack Marta. Safe and enjoyable as a story telling piece, if ultimately far from being a rousing spectacle fit for that particular part in history. 6/10

Frankly, I don't watch movies expecting to see historical accuracy. Movies are basically a commercial product marketed to earn a profit, which means pleasing as large an audience as possible. So, if there's a conflict between historical accuracy and constructing a more saleable story, we know generally which factor will prevail. That's simply the way our capitalistic system works. Thus, well-intended folks should not be surprised at the liberties taken in this supposed account of events surrounding the siege of the Alamo.

That being said, I thought the movie was very enjoyable. I thought so back in 1955, and again the other night on TMC. It's a good lively cast. Hayden may not have liked his role, but he's motivated nonetheless—catch how much he puts into the emotional exhaustion when he raps in vain on a door and then faces the camera in near collapse. That's probably the most animated this fan of Hayden's has seen him in any movie. The under-rated Richard Carlson also delivers as Hayden's rival, and of course there's the inspired casting of Hunnicutt as Davy Crockett at a time when Disney's Crockett dominated the big screen and the pop music charts too. In fact, Hunnicutt's little speech after arriving at the fort amounts to a masterpiece of down-home eloquence. And Russell Simpson's parson of-very-few- words is just the kind of no-nonsense character you'd expect to find among a band of back- woodsmen. Too bad, however, that commercial factors required Alberghetti's role. She's fine as the teenage aristocrat, but the sub-plot pairing her with the very mature Hayden amounts to the movie's biggest drawback.

One thing lowly Republic was good at is action sequences. Here the battle scenes and spectacle are outstanding—the collapsing parapet is both surprising and especially well done. For sure, the studio knew how to get the most out of limited resources, even as constraints show up around the edges, particularly with painted backdrops. Nonetheless, the enemy is treated with due respect, and I particularly liked the elegiac final scene with the traumatized women and children. It's just the kind of somber mood fitting for what has happened. Of course, Republic's reputation as a cowboy studio would never get its product much attention from either the press or the artistic community. Nonetheless, this is a surprisingly well-mounted and entertaining feature that can hold its own against bigger- budget action features of its day. Too bad, its many merits have been so generally overlooked.

This is a version of the Alamo story often overlooked mainly because it focuses on Jim Bowie as opposed to Davy Crockett as the central character. Sterling Hayden in one of the many roles he truly hated before escaping to the seas is a stalwart and heroic Bowie.

As I said though in another review of a film with Bowie as the central character, Jim Bowie was anything but heroic. He was a land swindler, slave dealer, no good con man who very few people had anything nice to say about. He was a tough guy though, no question about that and the famous Bowie knife was made to his specifications.

Bowie was married into the Mexican aristocracy and did suffer the horrible tragedy of having his wife and children taken in an epidemic of the plague. We never see them here or in the John Wayne film or in the new Disney epic.

Possibly the best acting honors do go to Arthur Hunnicutt who was more the backwoods character that Davy Crockett was then John Wayne. Billy Bob Thornton in the 2004 Alamo was probably the best Davy Crockett ever put on film and the most accurate.

Probably too much is now known for the general public to appreciate a film like The Last Command. The principals at the Alamo were three dimensional characters and not the cardboard cutouts they are here.

I always liked this Alamo epic better than Wayne's because it moved faster and Sterling Hayden and Arthur Hunnicutt looked like Jim Bowie and Davy Crockett might have been. Hunnicutt's death scene influenced Wayne's in his epic but I'll rate Hunnicutt's an A+ for less "operatic" posing and a more real "I'll take you to hell with me realism. The teeny bopper love angle could've of been dropped though.

Studio politics prevented John Wayne from getting the role he coveted.Wayne would have to wait nearly a decade before he would put his own vision of the Alamo on the silver screen. The film is magnificent and told remarkable for its era (a) with a recognition that Mr Bowie having married into the Mexican elite had become an assimilato, a naturalized Mexicano, (b) with sympathy for the Mexican viewpoint and (c) with respect for General Santa Ana.

The Travis of this version is not nearly the superbly arrogant martinet of the Wayne film nor the dummy who matures in combat of the more recent edition.

Regrettably unlike the Wayne film, this version omits the heroine of the story who knitted the Alamo flag-- the Mexican tricolor with the legend 1824 for the liberal constitution for which the Texans fought. Cut off by the Mexicans, the Alamo defenders would never have known of the declaration of independence or the adoption of the Lone Star flag.

Yet as the story of heroism against the odds, Last Command is first rate.