Wayne is good and this film allowed him to step up from B-movie westerns to the type of films that made his career. While it isn't earth shattering it is well crafted and well written in the context of the traditional western. Characters are shunned due to their social status, `good' people are revealed to be not so good as they think themselves while `bad' people reveal themselves to have good hearts and the potential for redemption in their lives.
#JESUS AND JOHN WAYNE WILLIE NELSON MOVIE#
The characters may be quite broad and the film may well use them like a disaster movie (set them up just enough to care about and then see who gets knocked down) but it does have touches that improve it. However this succeeds because it is more than just a B-movie shoot'em up, it has characters and sub plot. The plot is quite simple on one hand - a group battle Indians on their way to a town while some of the characters confront their own battles.
Although I miss seeing the desert landscape in full yellows and blues, this film is one of my favourite westerns and only suffers a little by being in black & while and not really enjoying the visual sweep that later Ford westerns had.
However the journey is made incredibly hazardous by the fact that Geronimo is on the warpath in the area they must pass through. All the other passengers have their own reasons for getting to the destination, including a vengeful outlaw, a prostitute, a drunken doctor and a cad. A stagecoach sets out across the desert with a load of passengers, looking to catch up with a military unit and drop off the wife of the officer in charge.