4 Star

An Army of One.

Based on the ‘Broncho Apache’ by Paul Wellman (Wild West: Kansas, Oklahoma, Great Plains), this was adapted by producer Harold Hecht (Marty, Run Silent Run Deep) and Burt Lancaster (The Train, Birdman of Alcatraz) and directed by the now famed Robert Aldrich (Twilight’s Last Gleaming, The Flight of the Phoenix), now it has been restored and released on Blu-ray by Eureka. Apache is a classic western, and with that we must say that this portrays very historic views and portrays violence against women and very archaic attitudes towards women.

It is 1886 and the legend of the South West, Geronimo (Monte Blue, Key Largo, Main Street) has surrendered and the Apache rampage is over. Except there is one last warrior, Massai (Lancaster), a man who will not live away from his mountain home and be separated from the woman he loves, Nalinle (Jean Peters, Three Coins in the Fountain, Pickup on South Street). Geronimo and all his warriors are transported to Florida, leaving Nalinle and her father Santos (Paul Guilfoyle, The Grapes of Wrath, The Seventh Cross) who is now the chief of children and old men.

Even a hawk is an eagle among crows.

They are all packed into a train by Weddle (John Dehner, Man of the West, Airplane II: The Sequel) and Al Sieber (John McIntire, Two Rode Together, Psycho), but when they get to Oklahoma there is a distraction and the manacled Massai makes his escape, far from his home he starts his journey. Along the way he comes across a Cherokee farmer who lives alongside the ‘white-man’ and he gives him a bag of corn seed, and tells him he can also live the way he does.

But this is a one-man army on the war path.

I cannot stop fighting. I am the last real Apache in all the world

Massai has a love rival in the new Apache soldier Hondo (Charles Bronson, Hard Times, Breakheart Pass) who is tasked to help Weddle and Sieber to track down this dangerous Apache. There will be lots of shooting and hiding in this classic western.

You call that life? If an Apache cannot live in his home mountains like his fathers before him, he is already dead!

APACHE (Masters of Cinema) Limited Edition is available on Blu-ray

 

LIMITED EDITION BLU-RAY SPECIAL FEATURES:

 

• Limited edition of 2,000 copies
• Limited edition O-card slipcase featuring original poster artwork
• Limited edition booklet featuring new writing on Apache by Western scholar Jenny Barrett and film writer Richard Combs
• 1080p HD presentation on Blu-ray
• Uncompressed original mono audio
• Optional English subtitles (SDH)
• The Story of Massai – new interview with Austin Fisher, author of Radical Frontiers in the Spaghetti Western
• The Last Sunset in Vera Cruz – new interview with film historian Sheldon Hall on Robert Aldrich and the Western
• Original theatrical trailer