Hondo (1953) on Netflix
Scout Hondo Lane reaches a ranch in Apache territory where Angie Lowe and her son Johnny live alone. The treaty is broken, and he urges her to leave for the fort.
- Netflix4.0/5
- IMDb7.0/1014,204 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes90%
Trailer
Plot summary
Hondo Lane, a dispatch rider for the Army cavalry, comes to a remote New Mexico ranch where Angie Lowe lives with Johnny, her six-year-old son. She says her husband is away with the cattle, though Hondo sees the man has been gone a long while. He warns her that the treaty with the Apache has been broken and asks her to come back to the fort, but she trusts her friendship with the Apache. Apaches led by Chief Vittorio and Silva reach the ranch. When Silva grabs Angie, Johnny fires at him, and Vittorio, impressed, makes the boy a blood brother named Small Warrior. Vittorio tells Angie that Johnny needs a father and that she must take an Apache husband if her husband does not return.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Hondo (1953)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- The shoot ran over schedule and director John Farrow had to leave for a contractual obligation, so John Wayne asked John Ford to finish the film; Ford shot the Apache attack on the circled wagons of the Army and settlers and went uncredited.
- For its 3D shoot, Warner Bros. supplied the newly developed All-Media Camera, whose twin lenses sat slightly apart; the bulky rig caused delays in remote desert locations, sand blown into its mechanisms frequently broke the cameras, and director John Farrow and cinematographer Robert Burks struggled with the unfamiliar technology.
- Geraldine Page, then known mainly as a Broadway stage actress working in the method style, earned a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination for Hondo, the first of only two acting nominations ever for a film shot or presented in 3D.
- Boston Celtics Hall of Fame swingman John Havlicek was nicknamed "Hondo" by a childhood friend who thought his demeanor resembled that of John Wayne's character in the film.
- Two later John Wayne Westerns nod to Hondo: a wanted poster for Hondo Lane hangs in the sheriff's office in Rio Lobo (1970), and in The Train Robbers (1973) Wayne and Ann-Margret play characters named Lane and Mrs. Lowe.
