Captain Apache

• Directed by Alexander Singer
• October 27, 1971 (US)
• Based on the 1965 novel Captain Apache by Sidney Edgerton Whitman

A full-blooded Native American Cavalry officer, while on a mission to investigate the death of an Indian Commissioner, finds himself investigating a large conspiracy.

The acid Western. A genre that Captain Apache belongs amongst. This starts off kind of weird-and that is being kind. The opening theme song is a mixture of singing and Lee Van Cleef doing a spoken rhyme. And that’s the best-done part. There is the kernel of a good idea here, but it gets lost in the poor execution. The strange comes about because of an obvious amount of incompetence and not because of intention.

Maybe it was the time in which it came out. Maybe it was a happy accident. Captain Apache often feels like a blaxploitation film with an entirely Caucasian cast. A poorly done yet entertaining one. There’s a lot of violence and gunplay and women trying to use their womanly ways and the hero is the toughest of the tough.

Lee Van Cleef is the titular Captain Apache (no actual name given) who is a cavalry officer sent to investigate a murder. Van Cleef is not bad casting but I am left thinking the makeup artist never saw somebody who was not white. Have Van Cleef get a tan and wear a black wig. It makes things accidentally racist.

One thing this does right is teases the phrase “April morning.” It is something significant to the villains but meaningless to Captain Apache. It starts as the last words of a commissioner and continues to be dropped throughout. It is a hook to keep you invested. You know it’s something big, but they don’t tell you what it is. There are no clues even on what it might connect with. Captain Apache knows it’s something he must stop but he doesn’t know exactly what he is stopping. It’s not until the very end (and I am talking the very end) all the pieces come together. And by then the threat is over. 

The same level of action and general violence is played throughout the movie. There are moments of quiet and trying to figure out the mystery punctuated by episodes of people getting shot or assaulted. What denotes the end from the rest of the movie is that Captain Apache takes a bullet. Pretty clear sign to the audience that they were at the end. Once the hero is put in a state that their time to function is limited you know the credits are about to come. 

What saves this movie is Lee Van Cleef’s performance as the asshole in charge of everything. He always has a situation under control. He’s the toughest of the tough. But other than the occasional mentions of his ethnicity you could actually forget his character is supposed to be Apache. Maybe it’s the lighting. Maybe it’s just poor make up, but there are times when he looks downright Caucasian. Like a black-haired Willie Nelson.

That is the least weird thing about the movie. Captain Apache is a series of oddities linked together by a mystery and the central character in a pleather jacket. I am still stuck on the Cap needing to strip down to his underwear (no hyperbole) to speak to an extraneous character that provided nothing worthwhile. This is one of those things that could’ve been good much better than it actually was. It just never makes it to that point. Either based on laziness or something else. Considering the era I am guessing drugs.

As a time waster filled with stupidity Captain Apache is okay. Not a great Western but entertaining enough. I just don’t think you will go back to it again.