John Wayne and William Holden work well together in this Civil War story of a Northern cavalry unit going behind Southern lines to attack and destroy a Confederate railroad depot. Wayne plays a former railroad builder who is torn between his desire to do his duty and his distaste at having to destroy things that he had spent his life building, and Holden is the army doctor who accompanies the unit, and arouses Wayne's ire because Wayne dislikes doctors even more than he dislikes destroying railroads. This is one of director John Ford's last pictures, and while not on a par with his better known westerns, it's still a crackerjack tale, well acted by the principals and the cast of stellar character actors--Willis Bouchey, Hank Worden, Bing Russell (Kurt's father) and old-time cowboy star Hoot Gibson among them--with Ford's usual top-notch action scenes and somewhat crude but not vulgar humor. The main drawback is the lame romantic triangle among Holden, Wayne and Constance Towers, who plays a Southern "belle" caught listening in at a meeting where the unit's strategy is being planned, and is forced to accompany them on their mission. It doesn't really work, as Towers' part is too sketchily written and she comes across like a third-string Scarlett O'Hara. There's a touching, and funny, episode when the unit is "attacked" by the teenage (and younger) cadets of a Southern military academy. All in all, a good action picture that will hold your interest.
Review of The Horse Soldiers
