Kurt Neumann gets screen credit for directing Mohawk, but I'd estimate that about one third of the film was shot by John Ford. Not that Pappy was around at all while this abysmal excuse for a B eastern/western was made, mind you. A little more than fifteen years earlier, he had directed a film on the same subject, the majestic Drums Along the Mohawk, for 20th Century Fox, with Henry Fonda in the lead. Somehow, some way, the producers of Mohawk got the rights to use the magnificent action scenes - attack on a frontier fort, a lone man running through the woods to get reinforcements while pursued by three Indians - within the context of their cheapo-cheapo production, which essentially is to westerns what Robot Monster is to sci-fi: As awful as it is, if you catch it in the right mood, you may find it to be so bad that it's entertaining. The plot, totally anachronistic as compared to Ford's ultra-authenticity, has Scott Brady (later Shotgun Slade on TV) as a loverboy (though a solid actor, he wasn't cut out for such a part). He's a painter who talks gorgeous Hollywood starlets (er . . . make them frontier lasses) into taking off most of their clothes for one of his portraits. Lori Nelson (pert blonde), Allison Hayes (star of The Fifty Foot Woman - the original, that is), and Rita Gam (as a Mohawk babe) all fall for him, and his character has more in common with Hugh Hefner than Henry Fonda in Ford's film. The point is, most of Mohawk was shot on a studio set in about three days, with a frontier fort that is mostly a big painting the actors stand in front of. Then someone screams something on the order of "The Mohawks are coming!" and, whoooosh - we cut to stock footage from Ford's film that is on a grand scale. The entire chase of Fonda is included, only when it comes time for a close-up, there is Brady's face instead of Hank's. It's that kind of a movie. Remember, you were warned.
