Cheyenne Autumn (DVD)

Largely unsatisfactory, this John Ford Western shows the old ways faltering. While previous films could explore a certain level of racism in the gung-ho characterisation of the Duke (Jean-Luc Godard claimed to have wept in the last five minutes of 'The Searchers', when John Wayne's Ethan Edwards abandons his pathogical hatred of the Indians), this more open apology to marginalised Indians in a depiction of the poor treatment of the Cheyenne indians doesn't really work. Both this, and Ford's film about blacks in the west, Sergeant Rutledge, are beautifully shot and well-acted, but they're fundamentally white films, pleading for minorities ...