Movie Type: Psychological Western, Revisionist Western
Themes: White People Among Indians, Adoption, Out For Revenge
Main Cast: Burt Lancaster, Audrey Hepburn, Audie Murphy, John Saxon, Charles Bickford, Lillian Gish
Release Year: 1960
Country: US
Run Time: 123 minutes
Plot
One of Hollywood's most famous and acclaimed directors, John Huston guides this western with an unerring hand -- the cast of notable stars is no drawback either. Setting up the story with a series of suspenseful scenes, Huston has a mysterious stranger on horseback come into a small community in the Texas Panhandle and then proceed to cause a mini-war. The time is the mid-19th century and there is already antagonism between the white settlers in the community and the local Kiowa Indian nation. The Zachary family is at the crux of the trouble. Matilda (Lillian Gish) is the matriarch who holds a family secret -- her adopted daughter Rachel (Audrey Hepburn) is actually a Kiowa child. There are three brothers in the Zachary family, and one of them, Ben (Burt Lancaster) is obviously in love with Rachel. Another, Cash (Audie Murphy) hates Native Americans, while the youngest (Doug McClure) is there to defend the family when they need it. The stranger on horseback has done the unthinkable, he has made it widely known that Rachel is a Kiowa -- and then the battles begin. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
Review
John Huston's The Unforgiven is essentially John Ford's The Searchers with the plot reversed -- instead of a white family seeking to recover a young member kidnapped by Native Americans, it tells of Native Americans trying to get back a member of their tribe, taken and adopted years earlier by a white family. The parallels are no accident, since both films were based on books by the same author, Alan LeMay, and the similarities don't end there. Both movies tell tales of families seeking to restore their wholeness or to protect it, led by defiant quasi-outsiders who are fully capable of violating any law, social bond, or moral taboo in defense of those families. Burt Lancaster's Ben Zachary is one of the actor's towering portrayals and a bracing performance, as a bold, powerful, lusty male presence, almost the embodiment of the gradually civilized frontier -- Audie Murphy gives a similarly impressive performance in one of his most difficult roles, as the embittered, racist brother of the would-be hero, torn between the love of his family and his disgust for the Kiowa and anything to do with them; and Doug McClure, at the outset of his career, gives one of the best portrayals of his career as the callow youngest Zachary son, a wild but good-natured boy who could go the way of either of his two brothers. Played against them is Audrey Hepburn's Rachel, who is like a frontier version of Cathy from Wuthering Heights, irresistable in her portrayal of a vibrant, coltishly innocent girl blossoming into womanhood. Those performances are enhanced by the boldness of the overall shoot, which contains barely a false note anywhere in its 121 minutes. Huston brought the same verisimilitude to The Unforgiven, including the dust storm, the vast open spaces with their promise and threat, and the siege of the homestead, that he utilized in movies like The African Queen and The Roots Of Heaven. The overall effect is a spellbinding western drama, filled with boldly constructed shots, powerful, charismatic performances, and spread along a beautifully devised story arc, embodying the mythos of the west and such fiercely topical issues as racism. And binding the whole package together in the actual viewing was Dimitri Tiomkin's score, perhaps the most passionate and romantic of his career, recalling elements of Duel In The Sun but possessing greater sophistication. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide
Albert Salmi - Charlie Rawlins; Joseph Wiseman - Abe Kelsey; June Walker - Hagar Rawlins; Kipp Hamilton - Georgia Rawlins; Arnold Merritt - Jude Rawlins; Carlos Rivas - Lost Bird; Doug McClure - Andy Zachary
The film, uncommonly for its time, spotlights the issue of racism against Native Americans and people believed to have Native American blood in the Old West. The movie is also known for problems behind the scenes. Huston often said this was his least satisfying movie.[1]
An old man, Abe Kelsey (Joseph Wiseman), claims that a member of a thriving frontier family, Rachel Zachary (Audrey Hepburn), is actually a Native American, secretly adopted as a child. Rachel's true brother and a gang of Kiowas return to claim her, saying that she is one of their own, stolen in a raid. The dispute results in the rest of the whites turning their backs on the Zacharys when the truth is revealed by the matriarch, Mattilda Zachary (Lillian Gish). Ben Zachary (Burt Lancaster)(who is in love with Rachel, with Rachel feeling the same way) tries to defend the family, but Cash (Audie Murphy), his hotheaded brother, is unable to deal with his "sister" being a "red-hide Indian." He leaves, but returns to help them fight off an Indian raid, during which Rachel commits a violent act, thus choosing sides once and for all.
Production
Aside from the unusual casting of Audrey Hepburn, the film is most notable for its behind-the-scenes problems. Production was suspended for several months in 1959 after Ms. Hepburn broke her back when she fell off a horse while rehearsing a scene. Although she eventually recovered, the accident was blamed for a subsequent miscarriage Hepburn suffered. According to several published biographies of Hepburn, she blamed herself for the accident and subsequently all but disowned the film, although she did complete it when she was well enough to return to work. Ms. Hepburn took the next year off work in order to successfully have a child, and returned to the screen in 1961 with Breakfast at Tiffany's.
In addition, Huston was constantly battling with Rick Height and his company, which was financing the movie, over how to film the movie. Height's company wanted a more commercial, less controversial, picture, while Huston wanted to make a statement about racism in America.[2] The result is that neither got exactly what they wanted.[3]
