Very few actors have such a good reputation and such a wide range of genres as Jimmy Stewart did, and yet the actor changed into most during his time. But apart from people like Isn’t life beautiful? And rear windowPerhaps the most productive genre of the film star’s career was the American Western, a type of film that idealized the Wild West while often analyzing modern issues. One such Western was the 1950 film Broken Arrowwhich was miles ahead of its contemporaries when it came to to portray the Indian peoples in a positive lightIn fact, the film was so remarkable (it received three Oscar nominations and a Golden Globe for Best Film Promoting International Understanding) that ABC decided to televise the story, albeit without the film’s wonderful star.

The Broken Arrow (1950)

Release date

00.08.1950

director

Delmer Daves

Pour

James Stewart, Jeff Chandler, Debra Paget, Basil Ruysdael

Duration

93 minutes

Authors

Elliott Arnold, Albert Maltz, Michael Blankfort

Jimmy Stewart’s “Broken Arrow” led to a television adaptation years later

The thing with Broken Arrow is that although the roles of the Apache Indians were cast with non-native actors (which was common practice in Hollywood at the time), It was way ahead of many other Westerns in the way it dealt with Native American issues. Previously, films like Stagecoach And Drumming along the Mohawk portrayed these “wild warriors” as simple antagonists without any real depth. Broken Arrowalthough not the only film to do so, was one of the first to give the indigenous population a real voice, something that was hard to find in 1950. Of course, it helps that the film was based on Elliot Arnold‘s book Blood brotherswhich in turn is based on the true story and friendship between Tom Jeffords and the Apache chief Cochise (played in the film by James Stewart and Jeff Chandler respectively).

Over the course of the film, Jeffords and Cochise develop mutual respect, and Jeffords (contrary to historical depiction) even falls in love with an Apache woman, Sonseeahray, and marries her (Debra Paget). The couple begins to broker a real peace between the United States and the Apache peopleand ultimately succeed. While the true story was much bloodier and somewhat more tragic, the film offers us an idealistic view of how things could have gone. But while the film chose to tell its own version of the events recorded in Arnold’s account, the television adaptation of the book did the original material a little more justice. By using the popular and instantly recognizable Broken Arrow Title, the series brought back Tom Jeffords and Cochise, now played by John Lupton And Michael Ansara (yes, the voice of Mr. Freeze in Batman: The Animated Series), beginning with a retelling of the events narrated in the 1950 film.

The first broadcast on ABC in September 1956 took place Broken Arrow was immediately celebrated as a classic by Donald Kirkley from The Baltimore Sunwho compared the series positively with the poorly received series of last season Brave Eagle. “Broken Arrowalthough not without its flaws, is the best television show about Native Americans ever made,” the critic noted, praising the show’s attempts to accurately describe the history of the Apache people and the Cochise in particular. While the Blood brothers Book was still a fictional report, Arnold had carefully researched the life and friendship of Jeffords and Cochisehence the television production’s decision to stick strictly to the novel. Radio magazine once noted that the show managed to “skilfully pack a lot of history into 30 minutes.”

The TV show “Broken Arrow” honored the high ideals of the film

The best thing about the show, however, was that it built on the ideals and themes first established in the 1950 film, continuing the idea that “white people” and Native Americans are equal in both value and presence. John Lupton and Michael Ansara have almost equal screen time in the serieswhich many media outlets praised for its bold stance on the Native American issue. “This type of friendship, while fairly common on the frontier, is very rare in fiction in any form,” noted Kirkley, who adds that the dynamic between the characters of Lupton and Ansara was the kind of “freshness” that television needed at the time. This was intentional from the start, as the series wanted to take the film’s concepts of tolerance and equality a step further into the television world.

“We found a good middle ground between Jeffords and the Indian leader Cochise,” said John Lupton The Minneapolis Star in a 1957 interview. “At the beginning of this season we tried to focus on Jeffords, but we found that we were losing some of our audience and went back to the original format.” It turns out that the main reason people tuned in to ABC on Tuesday nights in the late 1950s was exactly what Broken Arrow promoted, a common understanding and experience of the Wild West that blended these two culturesAnsara and Lupton worked well together and the pair played their characters side by side in 72 episodes between 1956 and 1960, at a time when the civil rights movement was really gaining momentum. But even that wasn’t enough to keep the show (sometimes Cochise in syndication) for a third season.

Accordingly The complete list of all prime time shows on network and cable television from 1946 to today from Tim Brooks And Earl MarshABC switched Broken Arrow of Tuesday evenings – where it played with The life and legend of Wyatt Earp And Cheyenne — Moved to Sunday in the middle of the second season, perhaps due to declining ratings. Unfortunately, this also meant the end of the series on television. In total, the series ran for an impressive two seasons, each of which Jeffords and Cochise work together to keep the peace between two otherwise intolerant groups. Sure, sometimes things got out of control and there were plenty of bad actors on both sides who showed up to cause real trouble, but these blood brothers got through it together. Today Broken Arrow is often forgotten in favor of its slightly older feature film counterpart, no doubt due to the exceptional performance of James Stewart.

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“Broken Arrow” is an excellent film, even if the TV version had flaws

But although Broken Arrowthe television series, was courageous in its handling of racial discrepancies and problems, it could not quite reach the standard of the 1950 film. Budget aside, John Lupton was no James Stewart, and many criticized the actor’s performance as “not quite tough enough” (per The Baltimore Sun). Ansara was also judged similarly, and the pair, despite taking their roles very seriously, were pushed aside in favor of the more dynamic duo of Chandler and Stewart. This is not surprising, because Broken Arrowthe film, deals with this conflict so powerfully in 93 minutes, while the television series consisted of 72 individual 30-minute episodes. It’s not hard to see why some would prefer the shorter narrative with the better actors to the longer series with decent performances.

Although it is not as famous as some of Stewart’s other legendary westerns, such as The conquest of the West, The man who shot Liberty ValanceAnd The Man from Laramienor as excellent as others like The naked spur or Winchester ’73his 1950 feature film was a huge success. Its success led to a relatively successful television show, and Hollywood has proven that the lives and perspectives of Native Americans are also important. They were not just vicious warriors out to raid your camp, nor were they one-dimensional caricatures who only spoke when spoken to; they were layered and complex, just like everyone else. Like the novel that inspired them, Broken Arrow The adaptations honored their historical characters and challenged us to strive for a better, more peaceful world.

Broken Arrowthe film can be streamed on Peacock in the US, while the television series is unfortunately not available for streaming.

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