Rio Conchos (1964)

This seems to inspire mixed opinions. I quite enjoyed it—as did Hardy's Encyclopedia of Westerns—but a quick search on the internet suggests others disliked it. Richard Boone obviously has fun as Lassiter, an embittered ex-confederate who's family were killed and tortured by the Apache, and who now lives mostly to kill Apache. He ends up roped in by the army on a low-key mission to recover some stolen rifles. He's accompanied by the captain who lost the rifles (Stuart Whitman), his sergeant (Jim Brown), a Mexican lady's-man and an Apache girl they capture later.

The criticisms of the film are:

1. The internet suggests much of it was taken from The Comancheros.
2. Apart from Lassiter, most of the main characters don't have a whole lot to do, especially the captain and the sergeant, who seem largely passive in the whole thing.
3. The middle part of the film drags a bit: they get stuck with no great idea where they're going, and it doesn't contribute a lot to the eventual ending. Which may be the point, but it doesn't quite work.
4. Apart from Lassiter (who's very well played and written) the best characters don't appear enough. The Mexican lady's man is killed of reasonably early, and their target - a former Confederate general who's stolen the rifles and is planning to supply the to the Apache - is wonderfully over the top, but really only in the last 20 minutes.

In summary, it isn't great, it's surprisingly violent for the time, but there's plenty to enjoy.

I watched it off a UK TV recording which was correctly widescreen. The colours seemed quite faded at this point. My suspicion is that the best version is probably the German DVD, but I don't know.