Devil’s Doorway (Mann / 1950)
Anthony Mann’s first western and one that is deserving far more recognition than it gets in my opinion. A tale of racial prejudice and the plight of the Indian in the post civil war west this film was a pioneer in terms of its treatment of the Indian in westerns yet seems to have been largely forgotten and overshadowed by Delmer Daves’ similarly sympathetic film, Broken Arrow, released the same year. This is a great pity because Mann’s film in many ways is far more hard hitting on the topic and cleverly places its Native protagonist in a familiar, white man’s position as landowner and rancher faced with encroaching homesteaders instead of as a noble savage trying to hold onto a traditional way of life. By ‘westernising’ the hero’s position his ill treatment and the racist laws that defeat him are thrown into a stark spotlight. As an Indian he is not a citizen and therefore is excluded from the homestead act legislation so whites can stake claims on his ranch land while he cannot. With the law working against him and a racist attorney hell bent on stirring up trouble it is obviously not long before our man reverts to force and things go from bad to worse.
Apparently this film was due for release a year earlier but was held back by the studio because they were worried how it would be received only to bring it out the following year on the coat tails of the success of the afore mentioned Broken Arrow. With Mann at the helm it is no surprise that the film is intelligently handled and looks great. Robert Taylor ‘blacked up’ in the lead role does a far better job than you might expect and the support cast all do a fine job. If you like Mann’s westerns and you’d like some evidence that American film makers were asking tough questions about the Indian’s place in the western as well as American history in general way before the revisionist work of the 60s and 70s you could do a lot worse than giving this film a whirl.