The Horse Soldiers (Blu-ray)
John Ford's Thundering Spectacle
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Also released as:
The Horse Soldiers (Blu-ray)
for $26.70
Blu-ray Details
- Rated: Unrated
- Run Time: 2 hours
- Video: Color
- Encoding: Region 1 (USA & Canada)
- Released: May 10, 2011
- Originally Released: 1959
- Label: MGM (Video & DVD)
Performers, Cast and Crew:
Starring | John Wayne & William Holden | |
Performer: | Constance Towers, Hoot Gibson, Althea Gibson, Anna Lee, Russell Simpson, Carleton Young & Basil Ruysdael | |
Directed by | John Ford | |
Edited by | Jack Murray | |
Screenwriting by | John Lee Mahin & Martin Rackin | |
Composition by | David Buttolph | |
Produced by | John Lee Mahin & Martin Rackin | |
Director of Photography: | William Clothier |
Entertainment Reviews:
An attractive musical score is a further asset.
Full Review
Maclean's Magazine
Rating: 2.5/4 --
Though flawed, John Ford's The Horse Soldiers has a fair amount going for it: the well-oiled partnership of Ford and star John Wayne (and an assist from William Holden); Ford's vivid visual style; and large-scale action. [Blu-ray]
Full Review
Groucho Reviews
Lively Western full of events and imagery.
Full Review
Classic Film and Television
Rating: 4/5 --
Fine Wayne and Ford western with equally strong Holden.
Video-Reviewmaster.com
It's a lesser Ford, rife with his backwards attempts at humor, but even a lesser Ford is still a film by one of the cinema's greatest poets. It's still very much worth a viewing.
Full Review
Combustible Celluloid
Rating: B --
This is a quintessential John Ford Western.
Full Review
Ozus' World Movie Reviews
Ford makes no explicitly anti-war points, yet his battle scenes-particularly the futile, heroic charges-don't come across as exciting, simply as absurd, wasteful, pathetic, and in all senses, bloody.
Full Review
The Spectator
Product Description:
THE HORSE SOLDIERS, John Ford's only attempt at tackling the subject of the Civil War, is based on Grierson's Raid, part of the Union's assault on Vicksburg in April 1863. After a number of failed efforts at taking the Southern stronghold, Union leaders assign Col. John Marlowe (John Wayne), a railroad designer in civilian life, to lead a cavalry detachment to destroy a vital railroad hub at Newton Station, far behind Confederate lines. Marlowe's unit includes Major Kendall (William Holden), a cynical physician disgusted by the notion that there's glory in the carnage, and the politically ambitious Colonel Secord (Willis Bouchey). Marlowe temporarily appropriates the plantation of Southerner Hannah Hunter (Constance Towers) while in transit and is forced to take her along, in lieu of killing her, after she overhears his plans for Newton Station. As their journey continues, Marlowe realizes that he is much more interested in Hannah than in her political sympathies. Wayne and Holden give gritty, soulful performances, and William Clothier's photography is outstanding in a film that delves beneath simplistic notions of heroism to reveal something more complicated, grisly, and real.