Another excellent script from Milius, which must have knocked the socks off those who read it at the time. It’s still impressive. It’s similar to The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean in many ways: based on a true story, about an individualist in the old West; loving, evocative big print (almost like a novel at times); particular dialogue; episodic structure; a non-Anglo wife who dies; colourful characters; a hero who becomes a legend in his own time.
There is perhaps more of an overall story than Judge Roy Bean – namely, the murder of Johnson’s wife which sends him off on a rampage, Dirty Harry style (another script on which Milius worked). This tends to go on a bit; there’s a subplot about Johnson’s adopted son, who was kidnapped by the Crow Indians who killed his wife, and becomes a Crow warrior. You expect a confrontation but none really comes – the son is killed in a final battle where the Mountain Men rescue Johnson, who’s been kidnapped. Johnson returns his son to the Crow and they have a funeral – Johnson’s rampage has caused the death of hundreds, but he feels bad about it.
It’s an individual, exciting work, which doesn’t perhaps have the best structure (in all honesty I can understand why they put on another writer, Edward Anhalt), but has genuine uniqueness. Like Judge Roy Bean and Apocalypse Now it's full of memorable characters and scenes: the guy left with his head shaven buried up to his neck, the crazy woman who’s family has been killed by Indian.
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