antonyornstin Note this is a review of the film as originally released-ie in the version approximately 2 hours long. I haven't seem the longer later versions. However this supposedly inferior version packs quite a punch. Its outstanding qualities for me were firstly a towering performance by Charlton Heston as the eponymous ant-hero. A man who is obsessed with his career as a soldier and is very good at fighting battles. However, apart from his fighting prowess the film progressively reveals him to be an adequate individual in many respects. Heston is excellent at conveying all these features and the character's internal conflicts.Heston "carries this picture but the rest of the cast is usually very good.. I found the persistent superciliousness and airs and graces of Tyreen rather irritating. I think this is mostly due to the screenplay but I think Richard Harris overdid things occasionally.The other noteworthy feature was some truly powerful and exciting (but brutal) battle scenes, particularly those involving cavalry. There are many other scenes involving horses which are usually excellently choreographed-in this respect I feel the film shows the influence of John Ford.The film is interesting also in that is quite complex.-In the sense that there are many different areas of conflict both external and internal. Major Dundee has many enemies of different kinds in the film but it could be said that he is his own worst enemy.I don't think I will dwell too much on the undoubted negatives too much as these have been endlessly dissected already. However the music is not a plus. it is too upbeat and in this sense I feel undermines what the film is saying about the brutality of war.The film is also occasionally incoherent, with some loose ends (eg what happens to "Linda"?). In places it has been brutally and incompetently edited.But for all its defects I have to say that I enjoyed it very much. Well worth watching.

Leofwine_draca MAJOR DUNDEE is one of Sam Peckinpah's earlier westerns, made before he developed his reputation for epic violence and slow-motion action. This one's basically Charlton Heston vs. Native Americans, as it follows the veteran Hollywood star as he assembles a team of ne'er-do-wells before sending them off to take care of a raiding party. Much of the narrative is about the journey towards the final pay-off, and a huge and sprawling cast serve to hold the viewer's interest; Richard Harris is particularly well cast as possibly the antithesis of Heston's character, both on and off the screen. There isn't a wealth of action but the film is quite watchable if no classic.

edwagreen While they knew what the score was, hard to fathom a group of Confederate prisoners would throw their lot in with Union soldiers to get revenge on the Apache Indians for destroying a village. This was the story that was kept in diary form of that adventure.As Dundee, Charlton Heston sounds like he is Moses at the beginning of the film, especially when he recites scriptures from the bible. Richard Harris plays his foe, a former friend and soldier with Dundee who went over to the Confederate side when war broke out.The film recounts their adventures whether it was with the French in Mexico and a confederate soldier deserting the regiment and Harris taking the obligation he had to take.Naturally, there is the love interest of Senta Berger.

FightingWesterner Though at times this displays director Sam Peckinpah's penchant for self-indulgence, most of the film is spot-on, with a muscular script, great Mexican locations, and an excellent, macho performance by Charleton Heston, in a role he was seemingly born to play. Likewise, Richard Harris is magnetic (in his first western) as his imprisoned Confederate counterpart, while James Coburn, along with the Peckinpah stock company, are a whole lot of fun to watch too.The only real flaw, in my opinion, is the subplot involving Dundee's seemingly forced romance with European widow Senta Berger and his recuperation from an enemy's arrow. I really couldn't imagine Heston's character having much time for courting the opposite sex. Berger does look nice though.Underrated.