Customer Reviews

Westward Ho [VHS]

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3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I first saw Westward Ho! The Wagons in a theatre when it first came out. In it was a song called Wringle Wrangle, sung by Fess Parker. I bought the video mainly so I could hear this song. Guess what? The song was not there! For some reason it has been deleted from the video. The video must have been made from a television print which was edited to fit the time slot of the Disneyland TV show. It even has fadeouts that seem to have been put there so commercials could be inserted. I was very disappointed. I always thought Disney videos were complete. The theatrical print was in CinemaScope. I hope they will release a DVD in widescreen format (2.35:1) that is complete.

STORY: In 1844 a wagon train comprised of many families seeking a better life heads out from west on the Oregon Trail to the Pacific Northwest territory. Captain Stevens (George Reeves in his last movie) must lead the pioneers safely through weather, tough terrain, possible Indian raids, and other trials and hardships. He is joined by Dr. Grayson (Fess Parker). Along the way the kids from the wagon train make friends with local Indian children. When the chief's son is seriously injured, Doc Grayson and a medicine man work together to heal him.

BEHIND THE SCENES AND TRIVIA: Directed by William Beaudine and produced by Bill Walsh. Filmed in glorious CinemaScope and Technicolor. Released to theaters on December 20, 1956. The original plans for this movie was for it to be a straight to television release titled "Children of the Covered Wagon", but it was decided to create a theatrical release with the project. The film is rather short at 86 minutes in length. The screenplay was by Tom Blackburn based on a novel by Mary Jane Carr. Blackburn was also a writer for the Davy Crockett series. Other studio regulars include Marvin Davis on art direction, George Bruns on music, Emile Kuri on set decoration, matte work by Peter Ellenshaw, and Chuck Keehne on costumes. This team worked on dozens of films and shows for the studio. Mouseketeers Karen, Paul, Doreen, Cubby, and Tommy all have parts in the film as well as David Stollery from the "Spin and Marty" stories. Darlene was supposed to appear as well but got sick during filming. Most of the beautiful location shooting was actually done in the winter at Thousand Oaks in California, at the Jannes family Conejo Ranch. (Conejo is rabbit in Spanish). Some of the night scenes in the wagon train camp were shot indoors on Disney soundstages. There were 5 news songs made for the movie, several sung by Fess Parker, including "Wringle Wrangle" written by Stan Jones. The songs "Ballad John Colter", and the title song were written by veteran Disney composer George Bruns and Tom Blackburn, and Bruns wrote the score for the film. Bruns also cowrote, "I'm Lonely My Darlin'" with Fess Parker. The song "Pioneer's Prayer" was by Paul Smith and Gil George.

Walt Disney was the master at cross-promoting Disney films, Disneyland, and Disney television. For the film he chose the hugely popular Fess Parker, star of his Davey Crockett series, as well as no less than 5 of his cast of the Mickey Mouse Club were in the film. He also promoted the songs from the movie in advance of the song. Additionally Walt created a behind the scenes film of the making of the movie, which he then aired as an episode of the "Walt Disney Presents Disneyland" television show on ABC. Back then all episodes were themed to an area at Disneyland, so this one was appropriately a Frontierland episode. The episode was titled "Along the Oregon Trail", and aired on November 4, 1956, over a month before the movie opened. The promotional episode aired again on February 20, 1957. After an introduction by Walt Disney educating us on the Oregon Trail, he explains that his new movie is a story of one of hundreds of wagon trains that took the trail. Then Fess Parker (with some help from Jeff York) who stars in the film takes over as our host for the episode. They discuss how hard life was for the pioneers in the wagon trains. Then with the help of other actors they explain why the Native Americans and the travelers did not trust each other, and how fear led to conflicts.
A few years later the original movie was re-edited in its running time as well as converting it to full screen for a television airing in two parts on the Walt Disney "Wonderful World of Color" television show (by then having moved to NBC) for the first time in February 19 and 26, 1961. The first episode was given its own title "Ambush at Wagon Gap", and the second episode was titled "White Man's Medicine". It re-aired on the renamed "Wonderful World of Disney" on NBC on October 4 and 11, 1970. The first release to home video was the 1986 release on VHS. On September 2, 1987 the original Disneyland opened a shop in Frontierland, called "Westward Ho Trading Co", in a spot formerly known as the Frontier Trading Post. If this was ever to see a DVD release, it would be nice if Disney was to include as an extra the behind the scenes episode for the film, which has not aired on broadcast TV in almost 50 years. It would also be nice to see it in its original aspect ratio of 2:35:1

This is a brilliant film, with lovely songs, romance and lots of action. A film with both cowboys and indians, in my opinion a real western. This is a must see for western fans.
I only wish this film is released on dvd soon.

Like the other reviewers of this video (Westward Ho the Wagons)Westward Ho, I saw this film in the theater. I recall a delightful Disney production with typical Disney production values. The video copy that I received (at a rather steep price) was a very poor quality copy of a television production that itself had been cut to fit a TV time slot.

The commercial breaks were obvious and badly blended into the video. The sound was poor and the picture quality was bad (almost colorless) in as much as it was washed out. The video appears to be a copy of a copy, not worth the $30 plus that I paid. I would strongly recommend that Amazon shoppers avoid the particular video vendor when considering future purchases.

James P. Hoban

This was a great western i wish they would release it on dvd fullscreen