The Far Horizons ** (1955, Fred MacMurray, Charlton Heston, Donna Reed, Barbara Hale) – Classic Movie Review 10,632

The rousing 1955 historical romantic Western adventure film The Far Horizons is the only major American movie about the 1803-06 Lewis and Clark expedition despite being a landmark event in American history.

Director Rudolph Maté’s rousing 1955 historical romantic Western adventure film The Far Horizons is based on the 1943 novel Sacajawea of the Shoshones by Della Gould Emmons, and stars Fred MacMurray, Charlton Heston, Donna Reed and Barbara Hale.

The Far Horizons is a fictionalised version of the 1803-06 expedition of map-maker Captain Meriwether Lewis (MacMurray) and army officer Lieutenant William ‘Bill’ Clark (Heston) from St Louis to the Pacific, with Heston and MacMurray in their full splendour, the scenery ditto, a lot of manly action, VistaVision and Technicolor images, and a bit of phony romance (for the box office) between Donna Reed as the Lemhi Shoshone woman Sacagawea and Heston as Clark.

The Far Horizons is not very believable, though, for a true story in the script by Winston Miller and Edmund H North adapting the novel. It is certainly historically misleading with many details fictional, the casting of Caucasian actress Donna Reed as Native American Sacagawea and the creation of a romance between Sacagawea and Clark although Sacagawea’s husband, the French-Canadian trader Toussaint Charbonneau (played by Alan Reed), was also a member of the expedition.

Despite it being a landmark event in American history, The Far Horizons is the only major American movie about the Lewis and Clark expedition, though there have been TV documentaries.

Also in the cast are William Demarest, Alan Reed, Eduardo Noriega, Larry Pennell, Julia Montoya as Crow woman, Herbert Heyes, Lester Matthews, Helen Wallace, Walter Reed and Bill Phipps.

The film is produced by William H Pine and William C Thomas, who co-produced a long series of B films for their company Pine-Thomas Productions for release by Paramount Pictures. It is shot in Wyoming’s Jackson Hole and Grand Teton National Park.

Release date: May 20, 1955.

Della Gould Emmons’s first book, the 1943 novel Sacajawea of the Shoshones, was unique in its time for using Sacajawea’s point of view and for Emmons portraying Native Americans as sensitive people with deep feelings: ‘After the Indian dealt with the white man, he masked his emotions.’

The cast

The cast are Fred MacMurray as Captain Meriwether Lewis, Charlton Heston as Lieutenant William Clark, Donna Reed as Sacagawea / Janey, Barbara Hale as Julia Hancock, William Demarest as Sgt Gass, Alan Reed as Charbonneau, Eduardo Noriega as Cameahwait, Larry Pennell as Wild Eagle, Julia Montoya as Crow woman, Ralph Moody as Le Borgne, Herbert Heyes as President Thomas Jefferson, Lester Matthews as Mr Hancock, Helen Wallace as Mrs Marsha Hancock, Walter Reed as Cruzatte, and Bill Phipps.

© Derek Winnert 2020 Classic Movie Review 10,632

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