Jeff Chandler and Joseph Cotten make the great performances here, flanked by Linda Darnell as a beautiful Spanish lady and Cornel Wilde. They are all wrecks of the civil war, Jeff chandler lost his brother in it, who was Linda Darnell's husband, and Cornel Wilde appears from the start with only one eye. There willl be more blood. A unit of southern prisoners of war are offered the opportunity to regain their freedom if they join the Union in a war against the Indians in New Mexico, and they accept it, just to be able to ride horses again and have some action of war again. Jeff Chandler is the commander of that desolate station in the desert, constantly coping with hopeless problems of Indian aggression, illegal tradesmen selling booze and weapons to the Indians, and his difficult relationship with his widowed sister-in-law Linda Darnell on top of that, whom also Cornel Wilde and Joseph Cotten love. The most interesting character is Jeff Chandler's brooding and limping veteran, tortured by his responsibilities and worries, a very complex character under severe stress who under all this duress of circumstances has to commit some mistake, which he does, and pays for it. You will never forget this character. The film is splendidly made, with powerful cavalry sequences, riders galore enjoying showing off to the cameras who wallow in shooting them, and a finale that touches on a great noir drama of destiny, like a Greek tragedy. In brief, this is a major western totally different from all the others and only the better for that.
Review of Two Flags West
