When one thinks of westerns one typically thinks of things like wide open plains, scrubland and the cavalry in a wooden fort... here we have swamps, jungle and the Indians in a stone fort... this is a Florida Western! The story opens with US Navy Lieutenant Richard Tufts arriving in Florida with a small boat which he has taken overland to Lake Okeechobee. He travels separately and meets up with Capt. Quincy Wyatt, who will lead the mission against an old Spanish fort on the opposite side of the lake which is being used by the Seminole Indians. One would have expected this mission to be the main part of the story but it is all over fairly quickly; the real story is about how they, and some rescued prisoners, escape through the alligator infested Everglade swamps with the Seminole chasing after them. Not all of them will make it; some will die at the hands of the Seminole, others to the alligators!
The Florida setting certainly gave this film a different feel to just about every other western I've seen; usually the worst natural danger in a western is a rattlesnake but the alligators here were more frightening and there saw a surprising amount of blood shown when one of the men was killed by one. There was a decent amount of action including a knife fight that takes place underwater! The acting is okay but lead Gary Cooper is nowhere near as good as he was in 'High Noon'; I guess this is down to the material he had to work with. Love interest Mari Alden looks pretty but her character isn't particularly interesting; we learn that she isn't quite the Southern lady she makes out to be but that revelation hardly affects her character. I'm not sure whether this will appeal to fans of conventional westerns; I think it is more likely to appeal to fans of adventure stories.
The Florida setting certainly gave this film a different feel to just about every other western I've seen; usually the worst natural danger in a western is a rattlesnake but the alligators here were more frightening and there saw a surprising amount of blood shown when one of the men was killed by one. There was a decent amount of action including a knife fight that takes place underwater! The acting is okay but lead Gary Cooper is nowhere near as good as he was in 'High Noon'; I guess this is down to the material he had to work with. Love interest Mari Alden looks pretty but her character isn't particularly interesting; we learn that she isn't quite the Southern lady she makes out to be but that revelation hardly affects her character. I'm not sure whether this will appeal to fans of conventional westerns; I think it is more likely to appeal to fans of adventure stories.