Customer Reviews

UNCONQUERED (IMPORT-ALL REGION)~PAULETTE GODDARD & GARY COOPER

5 star:		(39)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This was a mammoth production from director Cecil B. De Mille set in colonial America. The colonists confront Indians with a lot of gimmickry and daring-do. It is all based on the novel "The Judas Tree" by Neil H. Swanson and scripted by Charles Bennett, Fredric M. Frank and Jesse Lasky Jr. Gary Cooper as Capt. Christopher Holden once again gives a solid performance as the stoic yet homespun hero. Boris Karloff is over-the-top as the Indian Guyasuta. The amiable Paulette Goddard is good as Abigail Martha "Abby" Hale. Great action fight scenes punctuate this film. The moody woodland color images are the product of Technicolor pioneer Cinematographer Ray Rennahan. Composer Victor Young composed a rousing yet lyrical score. This film is pure entertainment and good old-fashioned moviemaking. It also starred Howard da Silva, Ward Bond, Cecil Kellaway, Henry Wilcoxon, Alan Napier, Marc Lawrence, Lloyd Bridges, Lex Barker, and Jeff Corey. The first-rate special effects were nominated for an Oscar.

This is one of Gary Cooper's better movies. Also stars Ward Bond, Paulette Goddard, and Boris Karloff. Cooper meets an indentured servant (Goddard) on the boat returning to America from England. Also on the boat is a gunrunner (Howard da Silva) who is selling guns to the Indians. Goddard is owned by da Silva and Cooper buys her freedom. De Silva reneges on the sale and takes Goddard westward with him as he delivers the guns to the Indians. Cooper finds out about Goddard and the guns and goes off to find the guns and Goddard. On the way he deals with hostile Indians, da Silvas henchmen and survival on the frontier. He eventually saves the day, gets the girl and the bad guys and defeats the Indians. One of Coopers best with lots of action and romance. Based somewhat on actual events in and around Fort Venango, Fort Ligonier, and Fort Pitt and the Battle of Bushy Run in Penna. Good story and well acted. Don't miss!!

Abby Hale (Paulette Goddard), a pretty English convict girl, is ordered deported as a potential slave to the American Colonies. Captain Holden (Gary Cooper) saves her from being auctioned off into slavery, and when she's captured by Indians and subjected to a slow and tortuous death, Holden appears in a flash of gunpowder smoke convincing the Indians that he's a god, so they relinquish Abby to him................THE UNCONQUERED was DeMille's 5 million dollar Technicolored celebration of Cooper's virility and Goddard's femininity and the American Frontier Spirit. Spectacularly stirring and full of fine action scenes, DeMille again screen-vitalised a chapter out of American history. One may say that he supplied both a boistrous and sensational delineation of the frontiersman's era with the full complement of DeMille devices, even to the famed bath sequence, a dip into the serial thrillers when the hero and heroine shoot the rapids to the the edge of a waterfall, and the staging of the battle of Fort Pitt that far outdoes any conflict that was ever dreamt up for a World's Fair carnival!

An excellent film!This takes place at Fort Pitt(when Pittsburgh was a frontier town)in 1763 during Pontiac's War(a by-product of The French & Indian War).With a budget of 5 million dollars,DeMille puts a very good story together that is based on Neil Swanson's book "The Judas Tree".It is also the first time that I've seen the subject of indentured servitude addressed on film.The viewer also gets to see an appearance of the 42nd Royal Highland Regiment(BlackWatch)and how they saved Fort Pitt.I would have liked to have seen more action,but the fighting scenes are adequate enough.

"Unconquered" brings DeMille and Paulette Goddard together again after two other big budget pictures (Reap The Wild Wind and North West Mounted Police). She and Gary Cooper carry the star quality of this picture with style and color. Fine acting against a wonderful technicolor background of Colonial America. Goddard's gorgeous red hair matches Cooper's towering stauture. They work well together and create some very amusing and touching scenes. Then add Demille's suspenseful canoe over the rapids and Indian uprising and you have good movie stuff.

UNCONQUERED remains one of my favorite films of colonial America. The ever stoic Gary Cooper represents the backbone of the spirit of America. This film tells a great adventure tale with a lot of atmosphere of perhaps what those time my actually have been like. A visual treat in that respect.

Made during the golden age of Hollywood, this is an excellent historical drama that takes place during the French-Indian War with Gary Cooper in the lead role as a plantation owner/explorer who falls for an enduntured servant portrayed by Paulette Goddard.

While the story-plot is ficticious, it blends well with the historical saga of the French-Indian War. The relationship between the French and their Indian allies and the British and the American Colonialists. The only exception that is kind of far fetched is having Boris Karloff as the evil indian chief, but that can be overlooked since it is the immortal Boris Karloff and his superb acting.

Overall the action, the plot and the technicolor, which was new when this was filmed, makes this a movie that fans of historical drama and action would enjoy.

"Unconquered" is a great historical epic set in pre-Revolutionary America with a "fight the enemy and never surrender" message. Gary Cooper owns the film. When he is on the screen, as is usually the case with his flicks, all the other characters revolve around him.

Cooper plays Captain Holden who is sent on a doomed mission to make peace with Indian tribes that have already decided on war. Holden's main nemesis is a traitor named "Garth" (played by Howard DaSilva) who has not only provided arms to the natives, but who is also secretly in league with them.

The romantic sub-plot involves an indentured servant, Abby Hale (played by Paulette Goddard), who is bought and freed by Holden only to be illegally re-enslaved by Garth. Both Holden and Garth are enamoured of Miss Hale, but you can easily guess which one of the two she loves back.

"Unconquered" exudes good old fashioned conservative American values and, partly for that reason, they don't make movies like this today.

Another reason you won't see a film like this today is because of it's politically incorrect portrayal of Native Americans. American Indians did torture, murder and sometimes even cannibalize settlers, including women, children and infants, but, today, Hollywood is unwilling to portray them as having been anything other than noble, peace-loving ecologists.

This DVD even has an "Introduction" warning the viewer that the White people are all portrayed as "good" and the Indians as "bloodthirsty." This is a pretty stupid thing to say given that the main villain in the film, Garth, is White. Why isn't there an introduction to the "Dancing with Wolves" DVD warning us about how, in that film, Indians are all portrayed as "good" and Whites are portrayed as "bloodthirsty"?

Unconquered is two-and-a-half hours of non-stop adventure set during the French-and-Indian War. It is also a wonderful love story. Gary Cooper and Paulette Goddard provide the fun with their on-again/off-again romance. It also has several spectacular set pieces, one of which is now a classic -- when Cooper and Goddard go over the waterfalls in a canoe. What's interesting about this is that DeMille doesn't simply toss this sequence in; rather, he sets it up with an earlier sequence in which Cooper stands under a rock outcrop by the waterfalls and studies an overhanging branch. The scene seems out of place and without purpose at the moment. But then comes the canoe and the falls and it all makes sense. This is prime DeMille hokum. Check it out.

Unlike the other terrific reviews that discuss the story and movie...i want to weigh in on the DVD...its terrific! Glorious color and sharp as a tack! I've been disappointed lately with several older FOX films on DVD but this is nothing short of glorious! If you are a fan of Cooper...don't hesitate! Paulette Goddard is delicious.