Apache Trail (1942) User Reviews (10)

Lloyd Nolan Opposes Law, Order, and Decency With Charm

[alonzoiii-1 · 6/10 · 26 May 2010]

Lloyd Nolan, cheerful black-hearted villain, shows up at his brother's stagecoach way-station, and menaces everybody there so he can get his hands on some loot. Will the denizens of the way-station force Lloyd outside the walls of the station, when justifiably irate Apaches march down the APACHE TRAIL to demand his hide?

This is a pretty good (if somewhat set-bound) western, featuring a nice villain turn by Nolan (who really does pull off both his trademark everyman likability and hiss-able villainy) and a ridiculous hot-blooded Latina turn by Midwesterner Donna Reed. There's nothing especially different about this one -- but the careful, somewhat slow MGM pacing and the generally good level of acting keep the subplots moving along. If you like Westerns, you might miss the stunting and outdoor photography you might get in other films like this, but you'll probably like what you see.

All in all, this is not a bad way to spend an hour and a half.

The Domino Judgement.

[hitchcockthelegend · 6/10 · 10 September 2013]

Apache Trail is directed by Richard Thorpe and adapted to screenplay by Maurice Geraghty from a story by Ernest Haycox. It stars Lloyd Nolan, Donna Reed, William Lundigan, Ann Ayars, Connie Gilchrist and Chill Wills. Music is by Sol Kaplan and cinematography by Sidney Wagner.

Ernest Haycox's "Stage Station" was put together as Apache Trail and ended up being a better than average "B" Western. Set essentially at the Tonto Valley Station, story finds Nolan and Lundigan as polar opposite brothers caught in the middle of the Apache's ire on account of Nolan's dastardly ways. Also at the station are a roll call of familiar 1940s Western characters, gruff men of honour, some lovely women causing sexual friction and a token Indian guy working for the whites.

This small group of people will have to defend the Station (come Fort) against what seems like 300 Apache's; that is unless they agree to give up Nolan, who of course has "not" exactly endeared himself to the group during the siege. While there's naturally the "brother" angle hanging heavy in the air, something which almost detracts from the love triangle sub-plot as the "honest as apple pie" Reed (playing a Latino!) and "smoking hot but questionable in morals" Ayars conspire to put hero in waiting Lundigan in a choice situation.

The production is a mixture of poor rear projection and stage work with gorgeous exterior location work (Tucson, Arizona), while the acting is exactly what it is, a group of actors either contracted to the studio, working for food or hopefully taking the first steps on the ladder to better opportunities. The photography is very nice, but the poor racist bravado of the era is not, while Thorpe's staging of action is indicative of his career in how he makes a silk purse out of a sow's ear. Accept it for the time it was made and this is a decent and enjoyable film. It was loosely remade in 1952 as Apache War Smoke, suffice to say that even then, ten years later, the material still didn't advance to anything out of the ordinary. 6/10

Lloyd Nolan plays the man in black in this Western

[jacobs-greenwood · 5/10 · 13 December 2016]

Directed by Richard Thorpe, this Western features Lloyd Nolan as the man in black, William Lundigan as his incorruptible brother, Donna Reed, Anne Ayars, Connie Gilchrist, and Chill Wills as supporting players in the cast of this Ernest Haycox (story) and Maurice Geraghty treatment.

The film begins with hanging Judge Keeley (George Watts) literally riding through town on the stagecoach to pass sentence on whomever the Marshal happens to have in the jail. It turns out the only man is Tom Folliard (Lundigan) who, after briefly hearing the charges and circumstances, the Judge releases for time served. Tom wasn't really involved in the stagecoach robbery his brother Trigger (Nolan) committed, but Trigger has yet to be caught. Not able to get his old job riding shotgun on the stagecoach, even though he's the fastest draw in these parts, Tom settles for a job as "the law" in a remote outpost that's constantly under attack from the Indians. Emory Parnell appears uncredited as Mr. Walters, the man who gives Tom the second chance.

Tom arrives to find that former friends, SeZora Martinez (Gilchrist) and her almost 18 year old daughter Rosalia (Reed), are leaving the dangerous town, but convinces them to stay. He is assisted by other deputies (Grant Withers, Ray Teal, Fuzzy Knight, Trevor Bardette?) and also hires a local Mexican Cochee (Tito Renaldo) as a helper. Tom rides out to meet the stagecoach, which then arrives with several passengers who unload to rest their feet, and eat the Martinez's food, before they plan to continue on.

The widow Constance Seldon (Ayars) turns everyone's head with her beauty, even Tom's who is watched by the jealous Rosalia and her mother, who love to make a match for her daughter. A sickly artist James Thorne (Miles Mander) and his wife (Gloria Holden) are also passengers. Just then, a cavalry officer Major Lowden (Frank Thomas) arrives to inform Tom of an Indian uprising; he's on his way to the fort to get help. Shortly thereafter, Trigger comes to the gate and is allowed by his brother Tom to enter as long as he gives up his guns, given the stagecoach's lock box. Tom stores Trigger's guns in the "safe" with the lock box.

Tom then decides to go and see if he can figure out the cause of the Indian's agitation. While he's away, there are various discussions between Trigger, whom everyone distrusts, and the others including Ms. Seldon. Based upon a conversation between Constance and the Major at dinner, Trigger correctly surmises that Seldon's husband was not killed in action, but committed suicide. He then uses the artist's guns and suitcase tray to capture the other men and their guns.

Meanwhile, Tom is rescuing 'Pike' Skelton (Wills) from the Indians. Trigger gets the lockbox and plans to take Constance as his hostage, willing or otherwise, before Tom arrives to foil his plan. The injured Skelton provides enough information for the men to determine that the stolen peace pipe Trigger had been flaunting is the reason for the Indians being on the warpath.

Will the Major make it through to the fort in time for reinforcements, or will the Indians' subsequent raid on the small outpost prove fatal for all of its occupants? A great battle will determine the outcome, but not before there's a crucial vote to determine Trigger's fate.

Lloyd Nolan's finest heavy?

[FilmFlaneur · 25 September 2001]

***SPOILERS*** ***SPOILERS*** This is a film which utilises the 'passengers in peril' scenario, familiar from more prestigious productions like Ford's 'Stagecoach' (1939, also originally written by Haycox). The difference here is that those threatened are stationary, having already travelled to the Way Station and their destiny.

Although there is some proficient external photography (Tom's rescue of Pike being a prime example), most of the dialogue here takes place on a sound stage, amidst a fairly extravagant set. Unfortunately being enclosed, sound conditions are distracting. There's an artificial echo to some of the talk, hard to reconcile with the impression so carefully sought of being 'outside'. It makes one wonder why the decision to film so much inside was made, considering the trouble and expense that has been taken. This is particularly puzzling when the climactic fight with the raiding indians is shot on a similar - but exterior lot. Having said that, the studio work is excellent and looks convincing. This is one of those Westerns where one can relish the attention to detail: the horses, the weaponry, the decor - everything in fact that adds up to a satisfying mise-en-scene.

At the centre of this drama is 'Trigger' Bill and his relationship to his brother. Lloyd Nolan steals the show with his swaggering credo, endowing Bill with a genuine sense of cruel bravado and low cunning which makes him a much more interesting character than his brother. As Tom, William Lundigan is suitably upright and looks the part, but after the first few scenes one feels that his part is somewhat underwritten. A scene continuing the antagonism between the two brothers would have been welcome as the stress within the station grows. Instead they only converse to any depth at the very start and then again at the end of the film, which means interest in their troubled relationship loses tension. Bill sees Tom as weak because he is 'gutless'. Eventually this view is modified and, as Bill grudgingly admits to Tom: "the trouble is that you have a heart". It is this belated recognition that Tom has something of worth, a humanity which his brother cannot aspire to, which inspires the villain's final sacrifice.

Such is the pull of 'Trigger' Bill upon the viewer that Tom's two romances somewhat pale in comparison. The excellent Donna Reed (Rosalia) has little to do but simper and wax jealously as she sees Tom drift away from her. Reed made relatively few films ('Its a Wonderful Life' (1946) being a cult favourite) and could have a dramatic luminescence which is largely wasted here.

Tom's brief dalliance with Constance is of interest not least because she is a 'bridge' between the two warring brothers. 'You and Me. We're the same breed' declares Trigger Bill in one telling encounter between them, and we sense that her haughty denials mask a recognition of this fact. But she has none of Bill's viciousness or romantic crudity. She is just a woman who wants a safe haven of her own. Her love for Tom, although sudden, appears genuine. We sense though that life at the station is ultimately not for her, even without a consideration of Rosalia's prior claim.

There is a pleasing symmetry to 'Apache Trail'. At the beginning Tom is released from jail and redeems his reputation to take up a new job. At the end, Bill dies to ensure the safety of the others, to an extent redeeming his. The religious imagery of his punctured hands is underlined by Tom's sober reference to a thief's presence at the crucifixion, a remark apposite if heavy handed.

Thorpe (a generally nondescript director) manages fairly well, although some of his camera set ups are unimaginative. The dominos scene, in particular, cries out for effective editing to bring up the drama. Instead the direction is relatively restrained, more naturalistic, and makes less of this key scene than it should. By far the most atmospheric moments are contained in the first few minutes as Tom meets the judge in the coach.

But this is an enjoyable film, better than the remake which followed a few years later. A must-see for Lloyd Nolan fans, others will also want to follow this 'Trail' to its end...

Apache Trail review

[JoeytheBrit · 6/10 · 24 April 2020]

Lloyd Nolan and William Lundigan are unlikely feuding brothers in this modest programmer that has faint echoes of Stagecoach about it. Although he was born and raised in San Francisco, Nolan sounds like he comes from the Bronx, which isn't a good fit for a cowboy. He's agreeably sleazy, though, and Lundigan makes a likable leading man.

Paying Your Dues...

[xerses13 · 6/10 · 6 May 2010]

APACHE TRAIL (1942) was Donna Reed's ninth role under her M.G.M. contract. As someone new at Culver City, Ms. Reed was put through her paces in a variety of roles, too learn the ropes. Here Donna is 'Rosalia Martinez' a immigrant with her Mother, recent from Spain and somehow stuck in the middle of the Arizona desert. Looking a bit too Middle-Western and with a unconvincing accent.

The story has all the makings of the 'B' Westerns churned out over at REPUBLIC. Brothers at odds with each other, the good, William Lundigan, the bad, Lloyd Nolan, renegade and all around creep. Usual cast of supporting Actors including Chill Wills, Grant Withers and Connie Gilchrist, etc. Also thrown in, some 'dudes' from the East with a 'femme fa-tales', plus a attack by the Apaches on their lone outpost. Competently directed by Richard Thorpe too the level or the limits of his talents, that were perfectly suited for this effort. At 66" it will not tax the viewer.

This was another of those thankless roles a rookie had to suffer through before making the grade and Stardom. I am sure that Ms. Reed's private thoughts were not that charitable when she first was given this assignment and the script. Though back then if you wanted to make it in the 'Studio System' you did what you were told. Ms. Reed proved not only a apt pupil but was good enough to play M.G.M. politics and soon would be getting more challenging roles. Her skills would finally be rewarded with the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in FROM HERE TO ETERNITY (1953) COLUMBIA.

Managing an Isolated Way Station in the Middle of an Apache Uprising

[Uriah43 · 5/10 · 19 June 2019]

This film begins with a cowboy by the name of "Tom Folliard" (William Lundigan) having been arrested and detained in a local jail for 90 days waiting for a judge to preside over his case involving an armed robbery committed by his notorious brother "Trigger Bill Folliard" (Lloyd Nolan). Fortunately, when the judge arrives Tom is immediately acquitted and released. However, when he goes back to reclaim his old job of riding shotgun on a stagecoach line he is informed that it has since been filled. That being the case he eagerly accepts an assignment managing a remote stagecoach way station which is nearly abandoned due to the increasing restlessness of the local Apache tribe in the area. But what he doesn't know is that his brother also has plans involving this way station and they don't coincide with his. Likewise, he is ill-prepared for a rivalry between two attractive women by the names of "Rosalie Martinez" (Donna Reed) and "Constance Selden" (Ann Ayars) competing for his affections as well. Now rather than reveal any more I will just say that this way an okay Western film which managed to pass the time easily enough and for that reason I have rated it accordingly.

Another Stagecoach story

[bkoganbing · 6/10 · 29 April 2020]

From MGM's B picture unit comes Apache Trail and the old saying in Hollywood is certainly true here such craftsmanship went into their B pictures at MGM that they would be top of the line at other studios. The story that Apache Trail was adapted from is by Ernest Haycox who wrote Stagecoach.

This is another stagecoach story with a group of men and women rapped in a stagecoach station with attacking Apaches. Among those trapped inside is Lloyd Nolan and it's him the Apaches want. His brother William Lundigan is the stationmaster. Will blood prove thicker than water?

Some of the plot elements and characters from Stagecoach you will immediately recognize. Apache Trail is not a classic like Stagecoach, but it's a competent and sturdy B western from that Tiffany of studios MGM.

Top of the line MGM programmer, one of their rare westerns.

[mark.waltz · 5/10 · 16 April 2021]

William Lundigan and Lloyd Nolan are brothers, as different as night and day, yet loyal in spite of the fact that good brother Lundigan is keeping an eye on Nolan as far as the money box is concerned at a wagon train stop where Lundigan is taking over a run. When the latest wagon train containing the widowed Ann Ayars and the married couple Gloria Holden and Miles Mander arrives, it creates a bit of tension as other new arrivals, mother and daughter Connie Gilchrist and Donna Reed (bizarrely cast as Spanish, but presented as closer to being Mexicans) have set their sights on Lundigan for Reed.

Rumor of an impending Apache attack has the wagon train staying overnight which adds to various tensions, and that leads to the battle where a few truths are revealed and Lundigan sees the truth, not only about his brother but about the two women that are claiming to be in love with him.

This is a better than average routine B western, a genre rarely made at MGM, and features a memorable friendship between a white man (Lundigan) and a young Native American, Tito Renaldo, whose face lights up when Lundigan offers him a job, and indirectly trust. Gilchrist is cast for comic relief as Reed's overbearing mama, but she is directed to be completely over the top and thus is stereotypically absurd. Still, a pretty good film with other memorable character actors (Chill Wills, Fuzzy Knight) to add to the atmosphere.

Decent MGM B western

[jarrodmcdonald-1 · 7 May 2023]

MGM didn't usually venture into B western territory. But when it did, as is the case with this title, the studio applied its customary studio polish so that even at just over an hour, it seems like a somewhat grand affair. In this case, they are using an Ernest Haycox short story about a stagecoach station that had been purchased from Sam Goldwyn who probably intended to give it a full "A" picture treatment.

The studio ran into a few difficulties with the production code office. The film presents two brothers (William Lundigan and Lloyd Nolan) who make questionable life choices. Apparently that was okay, since one of them-- Lundigan-- decides to go straight while the other one-- Nolan-- meets a violent death after not reforming. But the guardians of the code did not like the fact that Lundigan's character gets involved with the daughter (Donna Reed) of a rough ethnic woman (Connie Gilchrist).

MGM had to tone the ladies down, and it was not allowed to make them Mexicans. Instead the script had to be revised to make them Spanish women. However, anyone who watches the film can tell they are being played as Mexican stereotypes. I guess Hollywood did not want to alienate our Latin American neighbors with the war on, yet for some reason it was no problem to offend Spain.

Lloyd Nolan was borrowed from his home studio, 20th Century Fox, where he was in the process of making several Michael Shayne crime flicks. In the 1940s, he became typecast in police detective roles on the right side of the law. But in the 1930s, while under contract at Paramount, he had played several villains. Most likely, his bad guy outlaw part in THE TEXAS RANGERS (1936), where he was cast as Fred MacMurray's crooked pal, cinched his casting for APACHE TRAIL. It is basically the same character he's playing in both pictures.

As for Lundigan, he makes a valiant and focused effort here, but one feels as if he's probably miscast as a station manager. Lundigan was almost too urbane and sophisticated to be believed in westerns, and he would smartly stick to romantic comedies and noir when he returned to Hollywood after the war. One thing in Lundigan's favor, though, is his easy rapport with Miss Reed, with whom he also costarred in an Andy Hardy movie and a Dr. Gillespie movie.

Looking at this film now, one doesn't find anything too out of the ordinary. In a way, it plays like an hour-long episode of a western TV show. There are some nicely drawn characters, the conflict between the brothers is adequately explored if not predictable; and we have a climactic siege involving passengers at the station versus a swarm of angry Apaches who have come to get even with Nolan, who had murdered some of their own.

It is not surprising that Nolan eventually sacrifices himself so that the other decent folks may live. He has a memorable death riding out to be slaughtered by the warring natives. But all of that is quickly forgotten in the last few minutes, so that Lundigan can tell Reed that he intends to start a proper relationship with her...now that the trouble is over.