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During Stanley Baker's elaborate tissue of distortions and downright untruths the defenders at Rorke's Drift break into Men of Harlech as a riposte to their war-chanting opponents despite the fact that they were still an English regiment at the time and the concert never took place anyway. And they sing the song in English, not for the Zulus' benefit presumably but as maybe a concession to the film's American backers. The director Cy Endfield had been an old Hollywood hand until he was blacklisted and it's tempting to wonder if he lifted the idea from an identical scene in what proved to be Val Lewton's final production before an untimely death. I've no idea how true to history is the siege of Spanish Boot by the Mescalero Apaches but the presence of Welsh silver-miners among the population - and they were active in New Mexico and elsewhere - no doubt reflected Lewton's interest in ethnic cultures and traditions. And when the time comes they let rip with Harlech in Welsh which, for a Hollywood movie of its day, is doubly pleasing.

Yet another regime-change at RKO had left Lewton out on a limb after his initial run of success and he drifted unhappily between uncongenial assignments at Paramount and MGM before fetching up at little Universal whose budget-restrictions and thematic preferences he found more accommodating. And for the first time he could use Technicolor though the film commences on a dark interior before a door opens onto the outside world (maybe John Ford had been watching it too). Lewton and director Fregonese craft a sturdy morality-tale about an anti-hero who makes good in face of various forms of prejudice. Gambler Sam Leeds (Stephen McNally) kills a man in self-defence but is sent packing as an 'undesirable' along with the local "dance-hall hostesses" whom he later finds massacred after an Indian attack. A notable Lewton touch involves their dying piano-player (Clarence Muse), his scalping concealed under his derby-hat. (Lewton made a point of using black players in impressive cameos e.g. the vivacious Theresa Harris in I WALKED WITH A ZOMBIE and the little page-boy in BEDLAM.) Sam returns to warn the town but is disbelieved until the stagecoach comes back bristling with arrows. A young townsman rides for help but is found mutilated down a well, polluting the water-supply. Sam leads an expedition for replenishments and the hellfire preacher (Arthur Shields) who had spoken against him comes to his aid when the party is attacked. (Shields virtually reprises his role from HOW GREEN WAS MY VALLEY, the Welsh and the Irish usually interchangeable in matters of casting.) The chief Victorio is wounded and the Apaches withdraw for the time being. Back in Spanish Boot Sam is arrested for having given a beer to Pedro-Peter,the cavalry-scout(Armando Silvestre) during the waterless interim and is handcuffed to the bar-rail in the saloon. The town's mayor Joe Madden(Willard Parker) who's also the blacksmith and horse-doctor has an ulterior motive. Both men are rivals for Sally (Coleen Gray) the boarding-house keeper who's torn between love and security. But when the town is finally attacked in force she helps Sam get free and everyone takes refuge inside the church. The Apaches call for aid for their dying chief and Joe elects to go out to them but when Victorio dies they kill him. When night falls the "ghost dancers" - young painted braves deliberately sacrificing themselves for immortality - launch an assault on the defenders through the high windows in a wonderfully-lit and eerie sequence, the miners do their battle-song (one of them is actor and singer Sheb Wooley, later to add to Gary Cooper's woes in HIGH NOON) and the bigoted Reverend finds accord with Pedro-Peter as they pray together to their Great Spirit. As both sides fight fire with fire in the blazing finale the Cavalry arrive in a briskly minimalist wrap-up, Sam and Sally lead the congregation into safety and a pet donkey's newborn foal runs to its mother for milk. Solid and atmospheric with fine leads and an intriguing blend of the familiar and the unusual it rightly pleased Universal who wanted to keep Lewton on board but he decided to accept an offer to join Stanley Kramer. Sadly fate intervened and he never saw the release of his swansong.

Towards the end of 1951 I turned fifteen, just a year away from legal admittance to an X-film. The new certificate, recently introduced, posed an unwelcome obstruction and a moral challenge though I had few problems at my local 'fleapit' where they didn't always question you. Joe Losey's version of M, Cy Endfield's THE SOUND OF FURY and Russell Rouse's THE WELL were stark compelling studies of civil unrest accentuated by the guilty thrill of the 'forbidden' logo. Up the road at the 'de-luxe' however was a different proposition. Amid much larger, grander and more formal surroundings my soul shrank at thoughts of confrontation, of deceptiveness, of "trouble on the door". Sheer funk kept me away from DETECTIVE STORY even with Kirk Douglas in the lead and I let Brando and STREETCAR rattle by unhailed. But then came the crunch, a moment of truth - Humphrey Bogart in MURDER INC. (as it was known over here). What self-respecting film-nut could let that one get away without a struggle. With a grace under pressure Bogie would have endorsed I faced the big guns - the old commissionaire, the manager, the Lord Lieutenant of Glamorgan, the lot. "What school do you go to ? What form are you in ? And you're 16 ??" I felt like one of the Bowery Boys in night-court. All I wanted was to see the Main Man in action, not study for a life of crime. Hang in there, Bogie, don't start without me. They finally let me in though I don't think they believed me and it was worth every bead of sweat. It was a shock to see Bogie with an X pinned to his lapel but what went on was rather alarming...

It's an odd item in his chronology, a superior B-picture made apparently to wrap up his Warner contract. Relations with the studio that had made him a star (via some lucky accidents) had long been deteriorating and he was already making films for his own company through a deal with Columbia. As the Assistant D.A. doggedly trying to nail a reptilian crime-boss he was not so much the star here as the host, presiding over a series of flashback sequences before taking over command of the climax. He has no romantic interest (all the women in the film are small-part victims) and no 'personal' story is allowed for. His chief sidekick is a burly Police Captain (Roy Roberts), in effect a precursor of all the TV cop-shows waiting in the wings. The Bogart-link reminds us of his Thirties thrillers but there are no flashy nightclubs here, no wise-cracking molls, no cocky chipmunks fighting for territory. The hoods are murky and nervous in an atmosphere of dread akin to a horror-film which suffuses the whole piece. (It certainly felt like an X at the time). A slickly-wrought compression based on real events it introduced the business of "contract-killing" to the screen and never loses its grip. As others have noted it employs a CITIZEN KANE device - the hunt for a vital clue embedded in the past which may hopefully bring about closure and its nicely apt that Everett Sloane (as Mr. Big) appears in both films.

The more extreme violence is always off-screen, no bad thing, but we do get a splendidly-prepared shoot-out at the end when the D.A. rescues his crucial witness (marvellously etched by Pat Joiner) from a stalking hit-man. Real-life D.As probably don't do that sort of thing but this is Bogie going gat-for-gat against Bob Steele, his old adversary from THE BIG SLEEP. It works perfectly and whatever the studio politics that led to it it's a smashing send-off.