Artivels Undescribable Perfection

Evengyny Thanks for the memories!

Mjeteconer Just perfect...

Frances Chung Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

gullwing592003 This is an extremely well done, well directed & well acted excellent western about racial hatred & prejudice. The explosive conflict between the white settlers & the native American Indians the Kiowa's. Elvis in a very straight dramatic role plays Pacer Burton the half white half red caught in the middle & torn between his loyalty & allegiance to the 2 races. The story is very serious & compelling & filled with tension & action & graphic violence throughout except for the opening which is lighthearted with the birthday party scene for Pacer's brother Clint (Steve Forrest) as Elvis breaks into the only song he sings in the entire movie.This movie was originally meant for Marlon Brando & Frank Sinatra to star in as the brothers played by Elvis & Steve Forrest. It has an excellent cast with John McIntire & Dolores Del Rio as the white father & Indian mother. This is NOT a typical Elvis movie & Elvis really rises to the occasion & really delivers the goods as he shows what a great actor he was when he was given the right vehicle to showcase his dramatic acting ability. Movies like "Flaming Star & "Wild In The Country" gave Elvis the type of roles he wanted.But unfortunately Elvis' acting side was never really promoted & exploited enough to overshadow his "image" as a singing entertainer. We have The Col Tom Parker to thank for that, he knew how to manage Elvis as a singer but not as an actor. Most of his films were just platforms to sell his image & to get his music across.It's a toss up between "King Creole" & "Flaming Star" but I think Flaming Star is easily Elvis's best movie because he's not playing a singer & bursting into a song every 10 minutes. In "King Creole", "Jailhouse Rock" & "Loving You" & "Roustabout" he portrays singers & the films are used to sell his music as well as displaying his acting talents. But in "Flaming Star" the music completely takes a back seat to his acting to the point where you forget he's a singer. It's a great rare moment watching Elvis step into a deep acting role & not just being "Elvis". Another film that almost matches this is the later western "Charro" another serious movie with no songs at all except for the opening credits. Elvis really should've done more westerns & other dramas & should've kept his singing & acting careers separate. Imagine Elvis in "Thunder Road" with Robert Mitchum. How cool would that've been ? Elvis wanted the role of Joker Jackson in "The Defiant Ones", imagine Elvis as a convict chained to Sidney Poiter ? That would've been explosive ! Elvis could've done so much more as an actor. Watch this movie !!

doug-balch I was surprised and disappointed at the same time at this movie. Surprised because Elvis turned in a credible performance, disappointed because the fact the Don Siegel directed raised my expectations.Here's what I liked:Again, Elvis is just OK here, but looks great versus his other movie roles.OK story. I got sucked into it pretty good. I cared about most of the characters, even though it was a bit of a manipulative tear jerker.Pretty good performances by John McIntire and Delores Del RioI thought the character of the white brother Clint was pretty likable, and Steve Forest played him well.Now here's what kept the movie from being better:Fundamentally implausible that supposedly friendly neighbors of the Burtons would turn on them so quickly and so decisively. There was too much melodrama here. I didn't think they would have been so friendly to begin with or so against them after the Kiowa uprising.Sure, the Indians get a chance to voice their point of view, but how come they're the only ones that butcher innocent women? If the movie really wanted to be fair to Indians, wouldn't we also see white people killing innocent Indian women and children? Too harsh for white audiences? Undermines the anti-racism message.I always am uncomfortable watching these "tragic mulatto" plots. It doesn't seem fair that mixed race people are put into this extreme situations of being caught between groups. I imagine in most cases these people find their way OK. These highly charged melodramas come off as disrespectful to these folks.Poor use of landscapeNo comic reliefEnding was abrupt and contrived.

MARIO GAUCI Easily Presley’s most satisfying film overall and a first-rate if slow-moving Western in its own right which, once again, benefits from the assured guiding hand of a strong director who is an expert of tough action to boot. Curiously enough, some sources give its running-time as being 101 minutes but the DVD version I watched is only 92 minutes long!For the record, the lead role was originally intended for either Frank Sinatra or Marlon Brando (for whom Nunnally Johnson specifically wrote the script), but against all expectations, Presley gives an excellent, brooding portrayal of a half-breed (for which he was even inducted in a Native American society!); Barbara Steele was supposed to have played the female lead but proved unsatisfactory during a screen test (the principal film-makers reportedly didn’t want her from the outset because she was taller than Elvis and also since, in their view, she couldn’t act but the Chairman of Fox was clearly rooting for her behind the scenes!) and she was eventually replaced by Barbara Eden. Frankly, I feel that Steele would have been miscast anyway in this secondary role and, thankfully, the direct result of her missing out on this film was her iconic performance in Mario Bava’s Italian horror classic BLACK Sunday (1960) and a subsequent career as the reigning “Scream Queen” of Italian Gothic horror films!The title tune, naturally sung by Elvis himself, is very good (the “Flaming Star” being the Indian sign for impending death) and Presley was originally supposed to sing 10 songs throughout the film but, given its unusually somber tone, wiser heads prevailed and these were reduced to just two, which were then disposed of within the very first reel! Unsurprisingly perhaps, the end result of all this was that FLAMING STAR underperformed at the box office and Presley would basically never again be allowed to stray from the tried-and-true “formula” or develop his burgeoning thespian skills in dramatic pictures.Anyway, to get to the film’s plot proper: Presley’s family comprises white folk John McIntire and Steve Forrest (Dana Andrews’ brother) and an Indian mother, movingly played by Dolores Del Rio. Rodolfo Acosta appears as the aggressive new Kiowa chief who wants Presley to join him in his fight against the white man while, on the other hand, the whites also ask Forrest to choose sides. Eventually, this leads to much confrontation (also familial) and bloodshed – culminating in Elvis’ showdown with his tribe which actually occurs offscreen, and the film’s surprisingly downbeat ending is all the more effective because of it. Incidentally, that same year saw another Western in which a family is despised by the townspeople because of their mixed blood – John Huston’s THE UNFORGIVEN, which I should be rewatching soon in honor of the 20th anniversary of its director’s passing...

boomerchinde Line Elvis Presley up with a good script, great direction, and a plausible plot and you get "Flaming Star". Although the film could've done without his singing, at least it comes across as a natural part of the birthday party sequence and isn't overwhelming and stupid. Don Siegel, of Clint Eastwood fame, was always a good director, and much underrated. He holds this film together well, with Elvis as a half white, half Kiowa young man who must decide where his allegiance lies when the Indians have finally had enough of the whites. Addresses well the issues of prejudice in an era when that was mostly taboo. A couple of chilling moments, and a gritty performance by the always competent John McIntyre as Elvis' father. Barbara Eden is subdued as the love interest, and Delores Del Rio is simply wonderful as his long suffering mother. The skirmishes are well handled, and the ending is not trite, but realistic. Many claim Elvis did better work in his earlier films, but I disagree, this is his best effort, and a solid one at that. Tune in just to watch Elvis handle the two baddies who try to take advantage of his mother -- you NEVER mess with Elvis' mother!