Review of Flaming Star (1960) by David F — 07 Mar 2013

This Elvis Presley Western actually has a very dark tone and heaps of violence, racism and hate. I wasn't expecting such serious themes and subject matter. The King plays a half-white, half-Indian forced to grapple with his identity and his loyalties when a race war breaks out on the frontier.

This is way deeper than most pop star vehicles and actually captures some of the morose gloom of America's troubling racial heritage. There's just one brief musical number before it lurches down the vortex of this nation's disgraceful heritage of massacres, killings, gun violence, sexual assault, and clannishness.