Falling squarely into the middle of generic Hollywood Westerns, Duel at Diablo offers a grab-bag of characters and plot ideas tossed together like a salad. The character of Jess (James Gardner) is looking for the man who killed his Indian wife; Mrs. Grange (Bibi Andersson) is a woman once captured by the Apaches, who finds life after her rescue to be worse than her captivity; Toller (Sidney Poitier) is a hard-dealing, smartly-dressed horseman out to make a profit on breaking horses for the U.S. cavalry; Lt. McAllister (Bill Travers) is the dedicated cavalry officer struggling to whip together an inexperienced group of men on a dangerous but crucial mission. Some of these characters are pure cardboard, while others, like Jess and Mrs. Grange, have potential for interesting conflict and drama, but as they're handled in the film, somehow all the life leaches from the story.

Part of the problem is that the non-action plot boils down to very little at all. The main focus of the film is on the lengthy fight scenes between the U.S. cavalry bringing their wagons full of ammunition to Ft. Conchos, and the Apache warriors who are attacking them to steal that ammunition. We get lots of shooting, horses running around and falling over, minor characters killed, major characters dramatically wounded. And for what? There's no real emotional involvement that's been created here: why should we be invested in the fate of cardboard heroes being attacked by equally cardboard villains?

Fundamental to the story is the tension between the Apaches and the white settlers, as well as the existence of several "inter-racial" relationships: Jess and his wife, Mrs. Grange and her Apache husband. However, the film seems to dance uneasily around the edges of the racism and cultural conflict that are essential to the story, aware of the implications of the story but unwilling to bring them out into center stage and face them... perhaps not surprisingly, given the 1966 date of the film.

To begin with, the Apaches are shoe-horned into a role that doesn't really fit them in the story, that of dyed-in-the-wool villains for villainy's sake. Though the date of the film's setting is not stated, we learn that the Apaches have been confined to reservations (how convenient for the U.S. settlers who are taking their land!). However, a band of Apache warriors has left the reservation and is attacking U.S. troops. Lest we develop any sympathy for the Apache, they are repeatedly shown to horribly torture any scout who has the misfortune of falling into their hands.

Furthermore, when Mrs. Grange returns to them, the Apache leader quite irrationally condemns her to death; the only reason I can see for this is to forestall any tendency on the viewer's part to think "If she's happier with the Apache, why shouldn't she just stay with them?" It's worth noting that Mrs. Grange's Apache husband is conveniently dead when she returns to the tribe, thus sparing the filmmakers from depicting any scenes of sexuality or affection between an Apache and a white woman. Notice, as well, that while Jess was married to an Indian woman (how egalitarian of him), we never hear any mention of what their life was like together, he never even refers to her by name, and she is literally reduced to an object: her scalp, toted around in a bag. It's almost as if the filmmakers were uncomfortable with the inter-racial marriages and relationships that the story refers to, and though they left them in the plot, backed off as far as possible from actually showing them.

The film's problematic handling of its own themes might be worth overlooking if the film itself were entertaining, but Duel at Diablo strikes me as a film that's just going through the motions. While I've enjoyed other performances by James Gardner, here he really seems to be sleepwalking through the film, offering little by way of emotion or even reaction to what's going on. Combined with the threadbare plot and tiresome action sequences, the film just falls flat.

The DVD

Video

The film is presented in its original 1.66:1 widescreen aspect ratio (not anamorphically enhanced). The transfer quality ranges from reasonably good at some points to fairly lousy. On the positive side of things, the print is fairly clean, with no print flaws in evidence and a not excessive amount of noise. The main problem with the transfer is its handling of color: for the most part, the image has a decided brownish tint, but it also fluctuates at various points during the film, sometimes giving a scene a red tint and sometimes even a greenish tint. Fairly heavy edge enhancement is visible in some scenes as well. Given its 1966 date, Duel at Diablo ends up rating about average in video quality, but only barely.

Audio

The quality of the Dolby mono soundtrack for Duel at Diablo strikes a deadly blow against the possibility of enjoying this film. The balance of volume between different parts of the soundtrack is decidedly off; the dialogue is much too quiet and the action scenes are much too loud with respect to each other. If that were the only issue with the soundtrack, it wouldn't be too bad, but unfortunately the actual sound quality is poor as well. The dialogue is severely muffled and even a little garbled-sounding at times, and the louder parts of the track are harsh and tinny.

A mono Spanish soundtrack is also provided, along with English, French, and Spanish subtitles.

Extras

The only special feature on the DVD is a trailer for the film.

Final thoughts

With its threadbare plot holding together a few major cowboys vs. Indians action sequences, Duel at Diablo doesn't have much to interest most viewers. Given the lousy transfer, especially the terrible audio quality, even the most die-hard Western fans will only want to rent this;  on the whole, Duel at Diablo just warrants a "skip it."