20th Century Fox, 1939, 103 minutes
Starring Henry Fonda, Claudette Colbert, Edna Mae Oliver, John Carradine, and Ward Bond
Screenplay by Lamar Trotti and Sonya Levien, based on the novel by Walter Edmonds
Associate producer-Raymond Griffiths
Executive producer-Darryl F. Zanuck
Directed by John Ford

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The movie starts in 1776 as Lana (Colbert), a wealthy young woman, marries a farmer named Gil (Fonda) and leaves a comfortable mansion in Albany, New York to live in a rough cabin in the sparsely settled Mohawk Valley. Since the movie was made in 1939, there is the mandatory hysterical crying fit when she first sees the cabin but she quickly adjusts to frontier life. The only potential cloud on the horizon is the American Revolution (1775-1783), which has spared the valley so far, but there are rumors that the Tories have stirred up the Indians, so a militia company is organized for defence.

Frontier life, such as square dances and neighbors gathering together to help clear land, is shown in loving detail, although it is an idealized view of a happy community without the harsh loneliness that tormented settlers. Since there were no newspapers in the settlement, the preacher mixes his sermon with gossip and advertisements. A key element of frontier life for Hollywood is Indian raids and the movie contains several. The first raid destroys their homes but life on the frontier is not for the weak, so they rebuild and get on with their lives.

This was Fonda’s second time as a leading man in a Ford film so he knew what to do, but the director’s lack of chemistry with Goddard meant that considerable screen time was given to Edna Mae Oliver, whose crusty old widow steals the film. The preacher is also a delight, calling on God to smite their enemies and help them gird their loins for battle. Despite Lana’s initial hysteria, she proves equally capable as her husband to bear the hardships of taming a frontier, and portrays a surprisingly strong female character for the time.

In fact, the director’s attention to the women’s perspective leads him to show the agony of waiting for the men to return after marching off to face an army of Tories and Indians. Instead of filming the battle, Ford has Fonda describe it, while revealing both the terror of his first battle and his pride in surviving the experience. This was based on the slaughter at Oriskany when 800 militia marching to relieve Fort Stanwix, which was under siege by a force of British and Tory regulars, and Indian allies under the command of Colonel Barry St. Leger, were ambushed by Indians and Tory regulars. St. Leger’s expedition was meant as a diversion to distract American forces away from a much larger British army under Lieutenant General John Burgoyne that was moving southwards from Canada along the Lake Champlain-Lake George route to attack Albany.

A year later, the Indians suddenly show up to burn more houses and everyone ends up in nearby Fort Dayton. It seems hard to believe that 1,000 Indians managed to surprise them and it seems even more unlikely that the Indians would even bother trying to break through the fort’s strong, high walls but Ford wanted drama. However, unlike many movies of the period, the director had little interest in sugar coating the effects of war.

The film accurately shows the settlers’ fear of Indian raids and the frustration involved in pursuing an enemy that could melt into the forest. It seems odd to have a movie about the American Revolution without the British but Ford was in a tough position. He knew that war with Germany was coming and he had little desire to show the British as villains when they were fighting for their lives against the Nazis. Ford was a chronicler of American history, at least as he interpreted the history, but the more tolerant view that he brought to his later movies had apparently not yet developed. All of the farmers are patriots and the Tories are clearly evil since they stand back and let the Indians do all the fighting, while the only one who is seen at length wears an eye patch and is always skulking in shadows. In fact, the whole theme of the film is sturdy Americans braving tough economic hardships and then standing firm against evil tyrants. Ford’s treatment of Indians is probably at its most stereotypical since the Indians are mindless savages who are the lackeys of the Tories, except for one token “good” Indian, who is an ally of the settlers. However, his depiction of Indians would greatly improve over the years, although it could only get better, culminating in Cheyenne Autumn (1964).

While the glorious images of Technicolor make the frontier come alive, it is not Ford’s best movie but on the other hand there are only a handful of movies on the American Revolution.

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