THE GUNS OF FORT PETTICOAT

US, 1957, 79 minutes, Colour.
Audie Murphy, Kathryn Grant, Hope Emerson, Jeff Donnell, Isobel Elsom.
Directed by George Marshall.

The Guns of Fort Petticoat is an entertaining western, above average. It is a good Audie Murphy vehicle - typical enough of so many of his films. However, it focuses on a group of women having to defend a fort at the end of the Civil War. Murphy, from, the South but working, in the Yankee Army, is considered suspiciously but has to train the women as a group to defend the fort with military skill. The film makes a lot of comment about masculine-feminine roles and stereotypes. In its time, it used humour to indicate that the women were to be really men (which would not go over so well in later decades). There is a good supporting cast led by Hope Emerson in a role that really suited her strong, dominant personality. Direction is by veteran George Marshall.

1. An interesting and entertaining western? The Civil War? Military? Indians? The role of men and women in the defence of the West?

2. Colour photography, locations? The desert? The forts? The stunt work and effects for the Indian attacks and the defence of the fort? The typical score - for the Indians, suspense, the attack?

3. The title and its humorous and ironic reference to the role of the women? The absence of men? The demands being made on the women, their training, success in defending the fort?

4. The focus on Frank Hewett - and his work in the Northern Army, the context of the end of the Civil War, the massacre of the Indians by the military, his reaction and report to the authorities, his deserting to go and warn the people in Texas, his not being accepted, people ignoring him? The attacks of the Indians and his rounding up the women for the fort? The support of Hannah? Marg and her support, Stella and Ann? horses etc.? Kettle and his resistance, criticism?

5. The past romance with Stella? The romantic clashes with Ann? The training of the women, the preparing of the fort? The serious side, the comic side? The gamblers and their: arrival, Kettle's departure? The Indian attack, the devices used, his helping the women fight, the bombs planted, the capture of the medicine man, his being hung up and the fort being saved? Hewett's return, the possibility of a court, martial, his vindication - and the women coming to rescue him?

6. The Civil War situation, the clash between North and South, mutual suspicions? The military and its attack on the Indians? The cruelty? The strategy - the massacre for war purposes? The Indians on the warpath in Texas? The picture of the Indians? The oppression, the massacre, their vindication, their attack? Customs of war, religious customs?


7. The portrait of the women: Stella and her brother-in-law, her love for Frank, the experience of the war changing her? Ann Martin and her suspicions, the clashes with Frank, her part in the battle? Mary and her pregnancy, her devotion to Kettle, his playing with her affections, her freeing him from the cell, his stealing the horse and rejecting her? (And the encounter with the gamblers and his death?) The woman who was pacifist because of the Bible, her behaviour, refusal to fight, her change of heart?

8. Hannah and her working the farm, her support of Frank, her physical strength? Her presence, helping with the training?

9. The drill, the shooting practice, the fortifications? Throwing Indian attackers etc? How well did the film communicate the urgency? the difficulties for the women training, Frank's role? Their success? The siege and their shooting, defending the fort, the deaths? The woman being hysterical and Frank slapping her? Their working together?

10. The gamblers riding the west, the killing of Kettle after his betraying the fort, the attack at the fort, their deaths?

11. The conventional material of westerns for fort defences, Indian attacks? The variations on these themes - e.g. the hiding on the roof and the boys firing the shot? The women's defence? The taking of the medicine man to ward off the attack?

12. Themes of the American West? The Civil War? White versus Indians? The American heritage?