Les flèches brûlées

Flaming Feather casts Sterling Hayden as a rancher and Forrest Tucker as a cavalry lieutenant who make a bet as to who will catch the notorious outlaw known as the Sidewinder. Hayden whose ranch was recently burned out and cattle stolen is not satisfied with the performance of the army in catching this desperado. The Sidewinder has as his gang a collection renegade Ute Indians which makes him the army business as opposed to civilian law enforcement. Hayden and Tucker have a wager on who will catch him first as no white people know his identity.

It wasn't hard to figure it out just look at the casting. Even without IMDb identifying the Sidewinder on Flaming Feather's page it was easy to figure out by the kind of roles this player is usually cast in. The real suspense is whether Hayden or Tucker will wind up with leading ladies Arleen Whelan and Barbara Rush. Another good part is that of Carol Thurston who played many exotic types in her career and is the Indian mistress of The Sidewinder.

Flaming Feather is good, but highly predictable.

I consider this western as one of my favorite from director Ray Enright, a western specialist from the forties, as also was Edwin L Marin, both proposing Randolph Scott for many of those westerns. Here, you have Sterling Hayden, instead of Randolph Scott and the result is flawless for me. Victor Jory as the villain is not a surprise but the film shows us many action scenes, splendid settings, photography, and a fast paced story. I have not seen this film since a long time and I don't regret to have seen it. The forties western from Warner Brothers and Paramount were better than in the fifties.

Sterling Hayden stars as a cowboy who hits the trail in search of a renegade white man leading a band of Indians who burned his ranch and ran off his horses and cattle. The mysterious raider is responsible for the killing and looting of towns and wagon trains manages to elude the pursuing cavalry until events conspire to unmask the villain. Barbara Rush is the romantic interest of Hayden and also the renegade and her role is that of a damsel in distress throughout the picture. Forrest Tucker is good as an army lieutenant and there are comical exchanges between old timers Edgar Buchanan and George Cleveland. Victor Jury is also good as the dark, saturnine trading post owner. Arleen Whelan's role as a saloon singer doesn't have much to do with the film's plot but is quite a looker nonetheless. The technicolor is excellent, as is Paul Sawtell's spare music score.

Presumably, the title relates to the Red Feather Saloon, and flaming-haired Arleen Whelan, who sometimes sings there. Arleen's character: Carolina, is your iconic 'bad' girl, as opposed to Barbara Rush's 'good' girl, Nora. They both have occasional incidents with the lead male: Sterling Hayden, as Tex. Tex saves Nora from great harm on several occasions. Thus, naturally, she is friendly with him. But, she also feels gratitude toward wealthy local, Lucky Lee, who looked after her, after her parents were killed and their house ransacked and burned by The Sidewinder and his band of renegade Utes, who have been the terror of Arizona Territory for 20 years! Now, Lucky has asked her to marry him, and she has accepted. However, Nora has also developed an obvious attraction to Tex, and worries about his safety. Meanwhile, Lucky has a beautiful Ute mistress in Turquoise(Carol Thurston), which doesn't seem to bother Nora. Turquoise thinks Lucky should marry her, but he says a man in his (exalted) position should marry his own kind..... Caroline has an attraction/repulsion relationship with Tex. Sometimes, she tries to have him killed. Other times, she saves him from being killed. Sometimes she's angry at him. Other times, she proposes that they run off together. Caroline also has a thing going with cowboy Showdown((Richard Arlen). Most of these romantic conflicts will be resolved in the spectacular climax battle between The Sidewinder plus his Ute vs. most of those characters I've talked about, plus the US cavalry. This battle takes place in and around the Montezuma Castle Pueblo cliff dwellings, with a number of successive ladders to climb to the top......The main point of the story is the search for the identity of The Sidewinder, and eliminating him and his Utes......Some of the other characters include: Tombstone(Ian MacDonald): a shady gunslinger type, Forrest Tucker as Lt. Blaine, and his sidekick: Edgar Buchanan, as Sgt. O'Rourke. Another easily identified character actor is George Cleveland, who plays the aged Dr. Fallon: horse and people doctor, dentist, lawyer, justice of the peace, and no doubt a few other odd skills.......The location shooting takes place in various scenic areas of Arizona, and complements the 3 beautiful women included. You can see it all free, at YouTube

This a good picture for what it is. It seems to start out as a formula western with an age old plot, white man running with Indians doing bad things, lone hero sets out to stop him, etc. However the script is pretty good, there is some suspense, though we sort of know from the get-go who the bad guy is,the moment he shows on the screen. I love Sterling Hayden...for a guy who really didn't like being an actor, he does all right. Barbara Rush is beautiful and appealing. Forrest Tucker just shows up, and Victory Jory steals the picture with his oily charm.Edgar Buchannian is wasted in a role he really isn't suited for.

However, all in all, a pretty good picture. I enjoyed it.