Cheyenne Autumn
Cheyenne Autumn is a
1964 western starring
Richard Widmark,
Carroll Baker,
James Stewart, and
Edward G. Robinson. The film was the last western to be directed by
John Ford, who claimed it to be a sort of elegy for the
Native Americans who had been abused by the
American government and misinterpreted by many of the director's own films. With a budget of more than four million, the epic film was relatively unsuccessful, failing to earn a profit for its distributor,
Warner Bros.Cheyenne Autumn garnered an
Academy Award nomination for
Best Cinematography (
William H. Clothier) and a
Golden Globe Award nomination for
Best Supporting Actor (
Gilbert Roland).
The original version was 158 minutes, Ford's longest work. Warner Brothers later decided to edit the "Dodge City" sequence out of the film, reducing the running time to 145 minutes, although it was shown in theatres during the film's initial release. This sequence, with
James Stewart as
Wyatt Earp, and
Arthur Kennedy as
Doc Holliday, is considered by many Ford aficionados to be one of his best sequences. It was later restored for the VHS and subsequent DVD releases.
In
1878, chiefs Little Wolf (
Ricardo Montalban) and Dull Knife (
Gilbert Roland) lead over three hundred starved and weary
Cheyenne from their reservation in the
Oklahoma territory to their home in
Wyoming. The government sees this as an act of rebellion, and the sympathetic Captain Thomas Archer (
Richard Widmark) is forced to lead his troops in an attempt to stop the tribe. As the press misrepresents the native's motives and goals for their trek as malicious, the Secretary of the Interior Carl Schurz (
Edward G. Robinson) tries to prevent violence from erupting between the army and the natives. Also featured were
James Stewart as Wyatt Earp and
Carroll Baker as a pacifist school teacher and Archer's (Widmark) love interest.
