Desperado Trail

After learning that a large area of land owned by the Jicarilla tribe holds oil, a greedy group of white men, led by a man named "Rollins" (Rik Battaglia), attempts to provoke the Jicarilla into going to war with the American government--a conflict they would surely lose--which would enable Rollins and his men to claim the entire area. What Rollins doesn't realize, however, is that the Apache chief "Winnetou" (Pierre Brice) suspects that a plan of this nature has been devised. That being said, even though he doesn't know the identity of those responsible, he hopes to prevent a war at all costs. Therefore, he turns to his good friend "Old Shatterhand" (Lex Barker) for assistance. Now, rather than reveal any more, I will just say that this film essentially shares the same plot as the other preceding films in the series but has one major twist at the end that separates it from all of the others. Speaking of these preceding films, this film is the third installment in a trilogy that includes "Winnetou" and "Winnetou-the Red Gentleman" but this trilogy is interspersed with other films, making it difficult to ascertain the correct sequence overall. Likewise, I think the ending scene in this particular film makes that decision even more difficult. Throw in some apparent factual inaccuracies about Native Americans, and one might also question whether this was more of a fantasy film than a Western as well. Among other things, one specific example is that neither the Jicarilla nor any other Apache tribes had totem poles. It wasn't a part of their culture. Be that as it may, while I don't necessarily view this as a bad film, I didn't particularly enjoy certain aspects of it, which is reflected in my rating. Below average.