The Alamo (1960)

A film review by Christopher Null - Copyright © 2004 Filmcritic.com

Director/star John Wayne spends more time at the Alamo than I did as a junior high kid in Houston. This three-plus-hour epic feels longer than the battle itself, the most infamous part of the Texas Revolution, in which Texan troops were massacred by a much larger Mexican force. Wayne (here playing a roadkill-hatted Davy Crockett) is wildly overwrought (Jim Bowie: "My wife. She's... dead!" / Crocket: "I lived through it Jim. It's hard."), clumsy, and embarassingly directed -- and it doesn't get to the actual battle until the last 45 minutes of the film. Still, it's intriguing to see him on the losing side of a gunfight for once.

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Rating

2.0 out of 5 Stars

Cast and Crew

  • Director: John Wayne
  • Producer: John Wayne
  • Screenwriter: James Edward Grant
  • Stars: John Wayne, Richard Widmark, Laurence Harvey, Frankie Avalon, Patrick Wayne, Linda Cristal, Joan O'Brien, Chill Wills, Joseph Calleia, Ken Curtis, Carlos Arruza, Jester Hairston
  • MPAA Rating: NR