A young boy spends almost the entire film walking across the mountains for days, then, when he puts his feet up in one shot the bottoms of his moccasins are neither soiled or worn but look brand new.
The movie was set and filmed in the Mojave Desert, yet in an early scene at an Army camp, the still night air is filled with the sound of crickets and frogs.
This would be fine had the camp been in or near an oasis, but it clearly was not.
With no wind, there should have been no sound at all from outside the camp.
When 'Gregory Peck' (qv) walks out of the cabin he is unshaven, but when he's seen outside the cabin he's clean-shaven.
This is one of the Best Westerns I've ever seen. Its tautly written script allows the suspense to build slowly, steadily, inexorably right up to the end.
Gregory Peck, though not known for his Westerns, has done some of the best films in this genre. THE BIG COUNTRY stands as my favorite Western of all, though THE GUNFIGHTER, YELLOW SKY and THE BRAVADOS are all classics--thanks in no small part to Peck's wonderful performances.
This film opens with an intriguing premise with a veteran army scout (Gregory Peck) retiring and then acting as protector to a Caucasian woman (Eva Marie Saint) and her native son after she is freed from 10 years of captivity with a renegade Indian band. We later discover the trio is being tracked by the band's leader, a legendary killer and raider, and that Saint's child is his son.
Director Robert Mulligan did things in reverse! he started in television, and THEN moved into films.
The Stalking Moon is directed by Robert Mulligan and adapted by Wendell Mayes & Alvin Sargent from the Theodore V. Olsen novel.
Liberated from an Apache tribe 10 years after being abducted, raped and bearing a half-breed son, a white woman (Eva Marie Saint) neglects to mention to her Army rescuers that the boy's father is a fierce, bloodthirsty warrior who will stop at nothing until he gets his son back. Director Robert Mulligan was never a filmmaker of compact means--neither he nor his editors over the years ever shaped any of their projects with energy or excitement--and so, to put a western in Mulligan's hands was suicidal.
I thought that the song goes it's only a paper moon. Just kidding, but this disappointing film may have very well needed paper added to it.
"The Stalking Moon" is perhaps one of the finest roles which Gregory Peck made in his career. Few western films evoke the kind of suspense and drama this film presents.
This film was not worthy of either Peck or Saint. The plot could have resulted in a fine western, but the execution was abysmal.
