Arrowhead (1953)

Ed Bannon (Charlton Heston) is a civilian scout for the cavalry. He spent a few years as a child living with a group of Apache, which left him both well aware of their beliefs and tactics, but also deeply distrustful of them, to the extent it tips into hate.

Certainly, most of the soldiers in the cavalry units he works with think so, especially when he kills three men who were supposed to escort the cavalry to arrange a peaceful meeting between the cavalry and their tribe, and then that tribe attacks the unit on the way back to the fort, killing the commanding officer. Bannon is convinced the talk of treaty was a sham especially when he hears Toriano (Jack Palance), who Bannon was raised with during that stretch with the Apache, is on his way back from a school in the East. 

I mean, I'm sure any talk of peace was a sham, but I expect the U.S. government to be the ones failing to live up to the terms of the agreement, based on, well, this country's entire history. 

Everyone keeps telling him it'll be fine. The guy who runs the Wells Fargo station is blood brothers with Toriano, gave his son the middle name "Toriano," he's sure it'll be fine. Captain North (Brian Keith), in command after the colonel's death, has orders to make the peace happen, and keeps throwing Bannon in the guardhouse when he shadows Toriano. Nita (Katy Jurado), who handles Bannon's laundry and fools around with him (except when he's mooning over a white lady at the fort North also fancies) will listen to Bannon's theories, but she and her brother (who are each half-Apache) both seem to feel there'll be peace, too.

Of course they're wrong. Toriano is trying to play the prophesied invincible warrior who will come from the East to destroy the white-eyes. He leads a series of raids (we just see a few burned out buildings), then there's an offer to meet and discuss peace. Which North accepts, resulting in his walking into a very shitty trap.

(Seriously, it's the dumbest trap. Toriano has guys ahead and behind North's unit, then just lets the cavalry scramble into the trees at the base of a bluff without even trying to stop them, then just sends waves at them. I thought for sure he had guys waiting in the woods, or positioned atop the bluff, that he'd learned well back East how the Army worked and was using it to run them into the jaws of an ambush. Nope.)

There could have been something to this movie. That Bannon's experiences have so tainted his view that he needs the Apache to be untrustworthy killers, so he applies pressure, causes trouble, hounds Toriano and (figuratively) poisons the well until violence does erupt. And that violence gets Apache and soldiers alike killed, including Bannon's one friend, and Nita's brother, leading to her trying to knife Bannon. And Bannon in his hatred, insists she'll be imprisoned for a long time, apparently anathema to Apache (which he knows), and she kills herself rather than endure it. And the violence climaxes with Bannon in a fight to the death against the man who was once his brother.

But that's not how it plays out, not that I would expect it from a Western from the '50s. Bannon eventually reveals the circumstances under which he left (escaped?), and that he was hounded after that. Every place he started to build a life, the Apache catch up and destroy. So he decided he destroy them first, and helping the Army was the best way he saw to do it. So actually, his hatred is self-defense!

At no point is Palance subtle about the notion he has plans. He always has that intense look, and when he's dressed in a suit and tie, looks deeply uncomfortable, like he's about to crawl out of his skin. He's so happy to whip off his hat to show he didn't let his hair get cut short like the whites wear it while he was back East. Nita turns out to have been a mole all along, trying to get info about the Army through Bannon, and always despised him. The apparently loyal Army Apache scout turns out to have been on Toriano's side all along as well. The guys set to meet the cavalry at the beginning were hiding war paint under their hair, so obviously it was a trap.

On the one hand, the notion that pushing people into your schools or your military is no way to make them love you is solid. But in the movie, it basically means the Apache are a monolithic unit, all of them suspect. So Bannon was right about everything, everyone else that believed there could be peace was wrong, or a sucker. It's not helped that Heston plays Bannon as a complete dickhead. The fact most of the soldiers taunt him about being a white Apache, or blame him for violence, along with his reveal of how long he's been running (which comes when he's drunk and falling apart) are supposed to explain it. A defense mechanism to keep people at arm's length so their words don't hurt, but watching the movie, the back third feels like it's saying, "worst guy you know has a point."