Dir.: John Ford
Plot: A cavalry officer's dangerous task of protecting settlers from rebellious Apache is made more complicated by the arrival of his estranged wife and son.
If you happen to come across any of those unreconstructed heathens who insist against all reason that John Wayne couldn't act, this is the film to show them (either of the two previous entries in the Cavalry trilogy can be used to hammer the point home if needed). The fact that he could act doesn’t mean he always did, of course, and there are plenty of phoned-in performances amongst a filmography so long you could hang your hat on it - Wayne never gave more than he was asked to give, and very frequently he was asked to give next to nothing. John Ford was the only director who consistently pushed for something deeper than a ‘John Wayne’ cowboy archetype from his leading man, and in the Cavalry Trilogy (Fort Apache, She Wore a Yellow Ribbon and Rio Grande) he got it.
