part deux
The Party is traveling on their bootjacked raft when suddenly an arrow does the whoosh thing and THOCK, old Calvin is hit and dead on the first volley. Sporadic rifle and arrow fire continues. Only Jewel and Eloise seem to be rifle-packing so they each fire blind into the wooded shores. This is when Leah steps to the rear of the ferry, and seems to call up a wind that whisks them on their way, and out of range of their attackers.
Not for the last time, Fanny wishes her father were there.
Interlude #1: John Wayne�s birth name was Marion Morrison. During this film, tobacco products by Philip Morris and whiskey from Willie Nelson & Jim Beam were enjoyed by the viewer.
The Party continues on by foot. They have rigged the raft with dummies, and left the corpse of Calvin at the helm to continue down-stream. Smythe is convinced that the Shawnee who must be chasing them will continue after the ferry. Eloise isn�t so sure. The caravan makes slow progress, dragging a goat, a cow pulling a cart, several chickens, and a lot of sacks, the party progresses inland.
A musical sting, and some shots of figures flitting in and out between trees, let us know that they are being trailed. Jewel and Eloise (the fighting folk of the party) have their rifles at the ready when suddenly, a strange and stooped figure wearing a long gourd-like nose (mask) and wearing a floppy hat begins dancing around the edge of the clearing. He is speaking in a high voice, in a strange tongue, and waving back and forth two long sticks with blankets draped over them. This seems the cue for a small war-party of Indians (and three white guys� Renegade French? Squaw men? Huh?) to emerge from the forest. The Shawnee are chuckling over the strange dance of the mysterious figure. The three white men seem less impressed and appear to be waiting to see what the Indians will do. The two long sticks are revealed to be rifles when they open fire on the three men, killing two outright (the third is quickly finished off by knife) and utterly terrifying the Shawnee who take off running. It isn�t the violence that scared the Indians but the ruse it seems. The mysterious figure is Marion Dalton, who has been trailing the party in order to recover daughter Fanny.
Meanwhile Leah has found a clearing filled with white feathers. Just laying on tree branches and gently waving in the breeze, scattered everywhere. Dalton says that this means the nearby valley is shunned by the Shawnee. So, of course, that is where the party decides to go. And voila! They find several small buildings (obviously built by white men), long since abandoned, but still standing.
And this is where the movie kicks it up a notch.
Time passes, and unsettling things transpire as the settlers settle in at the abandoned settlement. Someone keeps screwing with the color-negative switch at the editing bay whenever spooky things happen, and Leah keeps seeing glimpses of living trees, dancing nekkid spirits, and a big muddy witch that is consistently sinking into the soft and loamy earth. A little Indian girl shows up, seemingly in return for gifts that the settlers left out for the spirits. Smythe is convinced that the girl has been left by the savages to be raised a good Christian. Leah disagrees, and so does Marion.
Why is Marion still hanging out with this crowd? Eloise may be climbing all over Rev. Smythe, but Marion will not leave without his daughter. And Fanny won�t leave without Eloise, who is being pawed by Smythe. Well, I can respect Marion�s family values. Why hasn�t he just up and shot or stabbed Smythe by now? Leah keeps getting spooooky visions of the little Indian girl with a horrifying demon face and glowing cat-eyes. At one point Fanny seems to be moments away from being sacrificed to something that lives in the woods. Marion & Leah save her, and see strange figures surrounding her for a split second before they disappear. At this point the narration takes over from Fanny to the little girl (either Meg or Cathleen, I dunno which) and goes downhill a bit in quality of delivery. See, Fanny is in some sort of a fever dream, but eventually Leah (using her strange semi-magic) revives her, despite Smythe�s insistence that the girl be left alone.
Sister disappears, then either Meg or Cathleen is lead off by the Indian girl. Jewel is wounded in the throat during a brief attack, and a compound is built as a result, not a very solid one either. Smythe continues to rally his less-than-thrilled party around his dreams� which are very vague by this point, but he decided to bring God to this valley, and so he shall.
Finally a siege of sorts is underway. The spirits run around outside the compound, throwing things in, while the settlers fire randomly. The Indian Girl proves to be as dangerous as Leah feared, but is destroyed before she can do too much damage. Marion attempts to escape with Fanny and the remaining little girl, but is captured by the Mud Witch and pulled into the murky waters by the evil tree.
I can�t believe I just wrote Mud Witch, Murky Waters and Evil Tree in the same sentence.
Somehow as things couldn�t possibly get any worse, Leah takes her clothes off. Now I have nothing against nudity, in fact I�m all for it. And Leah has a very nice natural and un-augmented body. But somehow nekkid threw me off. Anyways, Leah summons Marion back from the tree he has been possessed by and Marion seems to kill the witch.
During this epic battle, Eloise and Jewel�s wife have abandoned Smythe and the now-dead Jewel, and hidden Fanny and Meg (or Cathleen) in a trunk and attempted to escape the accursed valley. Somehow the trunk floats down river, but Eloise and Marion are finally reunited as the music soars�
And we cut back to the beginning, with Fanny (or is it Eloise?) and little Meg telling the mean French soldier what happened. The soldier assigns a guard to escort them back to their people (huh?) and as the guard steps from the shadows his eyes are� eyes of fire!!!
Interlude #2: Director of Photography Wade Hanks went on to DP 1985�s Terror in the Swamp. Also known as Nutriaman: The Copasaw Creature. If you know where I can find a copy, please let me know.
on to part three