Pawnee

George Waggner was a good western director, not ambitious but with good talent to show. This one will not stay forever in my memory. The basic scheme is interesting, a White risen grown up among Indians, but that's not that new; some westerns used this plot too. Anyway this one is an agreeable time waster with a George Montgomery doing his job. But everything is predictable, tha's an element which I always take care of. I like being surprised by something unusual and here, nothing of this kind. Many westerns were like this anyway. So just watch it for the quality, atmosphere, charm. Any die hard western buff will like it.

The Images are Bright and Colorful and the B-Cast is Strong.

However the Repeating Emphasis on Family, Child-Bearing and the Like,

Overwhelms what Little this Exercise in Cookie-Cutter Film-Making has to Offer.

It's Inoffensive White-Bread Population Control.

Even the Central Character George Montgomery's "Pale Arrow" Story is of Growing-Up into the Man He has Become in Search of His White Roots.

The Action is Minimal and the Extended Battles are Lifted from Other Films.

The Movie Offers Not Much More than Time-Killer Eye-Candy.

A Lot of it Takes Place on Fake-Looking Sets with Squeaky-Clean Clothes with Cliched Characters and Dialog Coming-Off as "American Family Pamphlet" Guide.

If there's Such a Thing as Typical "Cut-Corners" B-Western Formula, this is it.

Not Much to See Here...Only the Cast and Color are...

Worth a Watch.

An average western with the expected stock footage ( it's probably on the lower end of the B-budget) and some laboured pace, however, as per 1950's oaters, there's some juvenile charm in the cartoony dialogue (" he Pale arrow will die", well something like that), and it's a good time pass.

Could've been better with George Montgomery's character ( a paleface brought up by the Pawnee gets inspired to leave his people after saving Lola Albright and her father and join the wagon train so he can learn about his people, and consequently he saves the day) being conflicted between the white folk and the people who brought him up. The clash between Pale Arrow ( Montgomery) and the crazy fox is quite stirring.

This is just one in a huge string of westerns that Montgomery made over the course of his career. This one, however, falls pretty near the bottom of the heap in quality and prestige. In it, Montgomery plays a white man raised by Indians. (Hilariously, even though he has been reared among the Native Americans his entire life, his hair isn't as long as theirs and it's parted on the side just as it would be in any other film, but with two braided pig tails down either side!) Soon after he saves Albright and her crusty father from his own people's attack, he decides to rejoin the white race. This agonizing adjustment consists of him wiping off his face paint, removing the faux ponytails and changing clothes.......VOILA! He's white! Through plot contrivance, he winds up as the scout for Albright's wagon train (which is chock full of annoying stock characters who are shown in long shots knocking violently over rugged terrain, yet in the close-ups are barely rocking on a static, stationary prop wagon!) Chief among the silly characters is a frail, ancient pioneer wife who is pregnant with her first child. She is shown in shawls, etc...but occasionally can be seen in cinch-waisted dresses which reveal no belly yet gives birth right after! She and Freeman (later famous for her comedic gifts) and Albright (who still looked human at this stage in her career before turning her skin brown and her hair white) take time out from getting slaughtered by the Indians to buy themselves some new dresses in a nearby town. "Little House on the Prairie" fans will recognize the pregnant lady's husband as the Reverend from the later TV series. Eventually, Montgomery finds himself caught in the middle of the distrusting wagon train participants and his Indian family (incited by a particularly irritable "brother" who is out for blood.) All of the battle sequences are lifted from another film. This is ludicrously brought home when the screen is filled with epic numbers of settlers and warriors but the stars are behind a rock or off to the side watching! Unless it is to poke fun at the sorriness of the production, there's not much reason to watch, though Montgomery does display a still fit figure during some of his scenes as a Pawnee (notably in a "washing up" shot as observed by Albright.)

Pawnee is a cliche ridden mid-fifties Western made bearable by a good cast, professional direction, and some decent scenery. George Montgomery stars as a white man raised by the Pawnee Indians who must decide whether to remain an Indian and become chief of the Pawnee nation or return to his roots and save a wagon train from an Indian attack. The basic premise is old hat, and the film is loaded with stock characters includng the wise old Indian chief who seeks peace with the whites and the younger, violent war-mongering chief who seeks to kill the settlers (and his long despised white "brother" and rival Goerge Montgomery), the kindly and wise wagon train doctor, the wagon master who also becomes a rival of Montgomery for the love of a whte woman, a crusty, but lovable old coot of a settler, and so on. The film is juvenile and simplistic, but is watchable thanks to a good cast of old pros, fast and knowing direction, and excellent color photography of the scenic west. George Montgomery was a solid, leading man in many westerns of the fifties, and turns in his typically solid performance as the hero here. He is ably supported by such stalwarts of fifties westerns as Robert Griffin, Francis McDonald, Dabbs Greer, and Bill Williams. Lola Albright, an excellent, but underrated actress who later costarred on TV's Peter Gunn, gives a good performance as a yong woman traveling with the wagon train, who comes between Bill Williams, the wagon master, and Montgomery. It is noted that the lead Indian parts are played by caucasion actors and Native Americans are used almost exclusively as extras. The direction is by George Waggner, who directed the Wolfman and other horror films at Universal in the forties. Waggner is an old pro who moves the script along quickly and makes the cliches bearable while keeping the cast from going over the top in roles that could have easily become laughable. There is nothing new here, but it is a competent film which should mildly entertain western fans and youngsters who have never sat through a western programmer from the fifties.