Jinetes del valor

What a very expected "surprise" to have Forrest Tucker, Rod Cameron and Jim Davis - maybe for the thirtieth time together - in this colorful western from Republic Pictures. A very agreeable western, above average Republic Pictures, but made by the "home" western maker in chief: Joseph Kane. All the good old recipe and no real surprise. Every western buff will like this one. I would say it is some kind of poor man's John Ford's flick.

The U.S. cavalry has the task of keeping white settlers out of the gold-rich Black Hills, thus maintaining a treaty with the Indians, the storyline of which has been done in countless other westerns. Rod Cameron and Forrest Tucker and Jim Davis head a good cast, but character development gets the edge over action and prevents the film from being a cut above the norm. Cameron and Tucker have starred together in other western films and their pairing always results in mutual dislike and creates tense moments. Chill Wills has several good scenes as a cavalry sergeant and the film has excellent technicolor values. There is a good cavalry-Indian skirmish but the slow, meandering plot development of angry and greedy citizens who want to ignore the treaty and mine gold deposits on Indian land results in an average movie.

Rod Cameron stars as Captain Calhoun, a cavalry officer dedicated to protecting the rights of Indians from greedy gold prospectors. Calhoun's superior officer Lt. Col. Ungar (Forrest Tucker) despises all Indians, and makes things difficult for those who try to enforce existing treaties. Other interested parties include saloon owner Ira Jordan (Jim Davis), who is counting upon plenty of revenue from the prospectors, and saloon thrush Lia Wilson (Adrian Booth), who carries torches for Calhoun, Ungar and Jordan. An anticipated climax comes with a vengeance as the betrayed Indians attack Ungar's fort.

Oh! Susanna is a fairly ambitious western with lavish production values and good acting, especially by Forest Tucker who as a head of a Fort has a giant-sized chip on his shoulder and is egging for a fight with the Sioux. Jim Davis joins him as a negative character, also egging for a war - they both clash with Rod Cameron's captain character, a West Point man, who is trying to quell a war with Sioux, over a treaty and a woman ( Lorna Grey). It's a fairly good western with enough conflict, dialogue and action - the latter comes in the last twenty minutes with a rousing injun attack.

Overall, Oh! Susanna is entertaining, though the title is wrong as there's no link to Susanna, except that the song appears briefly in "The End". Not sure why it was called that - maybe the filmmakers wanted something unexpected and original.

At first I didn't think much, but as the plot became interesting I decided to stick with it. While I'm far from an expert on the Old West, the commands issued to the troopers seem real. What was more impressive was the detail of the soldiers loading and firing their single shot carbines. That was a nice touch. However, the use of colt pistols seemed wrong - I believe they would have Navy revolvers in the cavalry. I've read that soldiers were on the low end of the social hierarchy in the West and this was represented in the townspeople's attitudes, although in this case they had a specific reason. As far as the acting, I guess I have a soft spot for Forrest Tucker (maybe from watching F-Troop as a kid, as horrible as it was in retrospect.) Chill Wills was a hoot! I liked the way he yelled the commands - took you by surprise. So, all in all not a great film, by any stretch of the imagination, it was worth watching. And seeing the track record of the writer that's not surprising.

This has got nothing to do with anyone called Susanna. There is no Susanna in the film. Dumb title.

The US cavalry patrol the mountains to prevent gold prospectors from exploring and getting into trouble with Sioux Indians. As a consequence, they don't see eye to eye with local cowboys who are also interested in gold prospecting.

The story is pretty aimless and doesn't really go anywhere until we have the final battle with the Indians and this end sequence almost rescues the film. It just doesn't quite do it thanks to the bland characters that we have spent our time with up to that point.

The sound quality isn't very good but the film does score points for the outdoor settings and cavalry v Indian sequences. We get all the clichés - bar-room brawl, etc and the leading lady sings a song which is terrible. Cowboys want to hear an uptempo number and so do we as an audience. All Western saloon songs should be quick-paced with a catchy tune and colourful, cool outfits for the girls to dance along in. Not the nonsense served up in this film.

Overall, it's a "not quite good enough" for this effort.