Doringo!

I must admit that I know very little about Director Arnold Laven, who reportedly stepped in to replace the famous Sam Peckinpah. In fact, the latter even wrote THE GLORY GUYS screenplay (not one of his finer achievements).

Reliable actor Tom Tryon does his best with a role that sees him appear and disappear from the action without relatable logic. Harve Presnell, who competes with Tryon for the attention of exquisitely sensual Senta Berger, was much younger and not as good an actor in 1965 than in FARGO (1996) where he shone as the tight-fisted father in law who refuses to loan the sum that William H Macy so needs in order to get his business shenanigans up and running.

Apart from some very good battle sequences toward the end, there is not much that I find worth remembering... and even those sequences arise from a very basic millitary error that sees the US Cavalry pinned down in a valley with Indians descending from mountain and hilltops to attack.

Famous cameraman James Wong Howe is the film's greatest saving grace - lovely cinematography, superb battle choreography, credible stunts. 6/10.

The story of how General George Armstrong Custer led his troops to their deaths at the Battle of Little Big Horn in 1876 is a textbook example of military megalomania writ large in American history, and clearly a story ripe for a budding writer, which is what Sam Peckinpah was in the 1950s, when, at the request of the production team of Arthur Gardner, Jules Levin, and Arnold Laven (for whom he would create the legendary TV western series "The Rifleman"), he was commissioned to write the screenplay for Hoffman Birney's novel "The Dice Of God", loosely based on the Custer story, and which was to become the basis for THE GLORY GUYS. But by the time the story went behind the cameras in mid-1964, Peckinpah, due to the fury that he had caused in Hollywood with the extreme production conflicts on MAJOR DUNDEE, was about to be virtually blackballed from Hollywood. And while the end result is nowhere near a terrible product, one has to wonder just how much further this film would have gone had Peckinpah been given the opportunity to direct his own script, which he in fact never did, contrary to what has been reported here at the Internet Movie Database (I for one would like to see corroborating evidence of that claim that he directed even a small part of it).

Even in the finished film, there are themes Peckinpah had broached upon that are still there--the conflict between two men (Harve Presnell; Tom Tryon) and their commanding officer, a steely-eyed, almost dictatorial Cavalry commander (Andrew Duggan) out to put the Sioux in their place. As this kind of scenario had loosely played itself out in MAJOR DUNDEE, however, Laven, who directed the film, seemed to shift the film away from this critical look at personal and military obsession to the love triangle between Tryon, Presnell, and a pioneer woman (Senta Berger, returning from MAJOR DUNDEE) at their fort. It was a point that Peckinpah strongly (and unsurprisingly) found highly disagreeable, since his focus was on the near-fundamentalist behavior of Duggan's character. In the meantime, Laven does stage plenty of good action scenes, including the attack on the Sioux, but they don't have the kind of raw (let alone bloody) energy that Peckinpah would have bought to them, and the editing of these scenes, while more than competent, isn't quite up to what was even done in the action scenes of the unfairly butchered DUNDEE.

Still, it's hard to say too many bad things about a film that is still as far removed from the old John Ford/John Wayne cavalry films as MAJOR DUNDEE had been; and Tryon and Presnell are extremely competent in their roles (though rumor has it that Lee Marvin and James Coburn were both considered first, before salary conflicts forced Laven to settle for the other two). There are also early roles for James Caan as an Irish-born cavalryman; and Wayne Rogers, later to star in the long-running TV series M*A*S*H, as another cavalry officer. Slim Pickens, who is never anything less than memorable, also does a good turn as one of the members of the cavalry. Perhaps the best thing about THE GLORY GUYS, besides those moments when the film lays Duggan's military megalomania bare, is the superb cinematography, most of it done on location near Durango, Mexico, of James Wong Howe, who had won an Oscar in 1963 for HUD.

All in all, THE GLORY GUYS does hold up as an extremely competent film. But it still leaves one to wonder just how much further up the ladder of quality sagebrush film making it would have gone had Peckinpah been the one in the director's chair, as opposed to the more workmanlike direction of Laven. One can, unfortunately, only speculate.

I cringed when the opening credits started and some horrible song invaded my ear drums, but then things got better and I was pleasantly surprised while watching this film in its widescreen version. The acting was very good, the Calvary life on a dusty western post was well depicted, and the direction, albeit cheesy in some of chivalry scenes between the two leading men and typical bar fights of the genre, was pretty good considering the simple and predictable plot line.

I think James Caan's part of Pvt. Anthony Dugan was well acted and gives us a hint to his impending stardom. Beautiful Senta Berger was just okay in her part of Lou Woddard but there wasn't much for her to do except officiate the battle between Tom Tryon and Harve Presnell for her hand. The other parts weren't that special either but what made the film play out well in my eyes was the appearance of authenticity of a western Calvary company. From the initial gathering of a bunch of green troops through their training and drilling, and complaining, to the final well oiled product that had at least a fighting chance of survival in a big campaign against the Indians.

I would recommend this film for those who like westerns and give it 6.5 stars out of 10.

The Glory Guys is directed by Arnold Laven and written by Sam Peckinpah who adapts from the Hoffman Birney novel, The Dice of God. It stars Tom Tryon, Harve Presnell, Senta Berger, James Caan, Andrew Duggan, Slim Pickens and Michael Anderson Jr. It's shot in Panavision with colour by Deluxe, with James Wong Howe the photographer, and music is scored by Riz Ortolani.

The Glory Guys are young recruits to the 3rd Regiment of the United States Cavalry, film follows them as they live and love thru their initial training and onwards to impending war with the Indians. They be at the mercy of a warmongering general, their passions and fate, cruel avoidable fate.

It's one of those War Westerns that cried out for some quality actors to tell the tale. For the story is a great one, no doubt inspired by the Custer legend from Battle of Little Big Horn, the scenery (Durango, Mexico) is first rate and the score is suitably perky and rousing: with the title song tremendous in its power. There's even some terrific action, especially for the major battle in the last quarter, where the use of 100's of extras provides excitement as the bloody carnage convincingly unfolds. But getting to that last third in the company of wooden lead actors is not that easy to do, Pickens, Duggan and Caan aside (tho Caan's Irish accent fluctuates), the principal actors are unable to put real urgency into the drama. Laven's pacing is questionable too, but the director comes out in credit because his final flourish, the battle construction, really is worth the wait. But one can't help wondering what Peckinpah in his pomp could have done with his own script.

A very mixed bag when put under scrutiny, but with a glorious and potent final third bringing it to closure, The Glory Guys is safely recommended to fans of the Custer legend, and indeed, fans of film's like Major Dundee & Fort Apache. 6.5/10

Great acting and based on the Custer debacle. Peckinpah does a great job with little blood and gore but great scenes of combat. I note that a viewer says he saw additional scenes so let me comment on that; I saw the movie at the drive-in my first time and the version currently on video from MGM/UA is complete. TV versions cut out one specific scene for extra commercials, the entire scene where the troop leaves the fort with no weapons and suffers a simulated Indian attack, with Duggan nearly strangling one acting Indian (about 12-15 min.)The only thing missing is the widescreen version as the video is P&S. I also saw the movie in France, dubbed in French in widescreen and the many off-screen elements show that this movie needs a WS release. Of note is the historical accuracy of the weapons and uniforms. WIDESCREEN please!