Daniel Boone: The Warrior's Path (1960)

Director: Lewis R. Foster

Writer: David Victor

Composers: Buddy Baker, Oliver Wallace, Frank Worth

Starring: Dewey Martin, Mala Powers, Richard Banke, Eddy Waller, Kevin Corcoran, Brian Corcoran, Diane Jergens, William Herrin, Dean Fredericks, Anthony Caruso, Don Dorrell, Alex Gerry, Eddie Little Sky, Charles Stevens, Walt Disney

More info: IMDb

Plot:  Long before the West was explored to it's fullest, the frontiersman Daniel Boone had a powerful need to expand westward and to see Kentucky Territory. This was an unexplored wilderness on the westward side of the Cumberland mountains and a secret Indian hunting grounds. A traveling peddler tells Mr. Boone of a hidden way to enter that area through a secret Indian trail called the 'Warrior's Path'. So Boone sets out with the peddler and friends to find the path and runs into a Shawnee hunting parting, but finally discovers the unexplored garden-like valley for the eventual westward movement of 18th century Eastern seaboard settlers.

My rating: 6/10

Will I watch it again?  No.

This feels like an attempt to recapture the success of what Disney did with Fess Parker and Davy Crockett from five years earlier.  If that's the case they failed.  This isn't even close.  Dewey Martin could just have easily been at home playing a soda jerk at your local drug store in Anytown, USA.  He's a good looking kid that looks and sounds out of place.  In the first 8 minutes of the movie, and that includes the Wonderful World of Disney opening with Walt himself, 4 minutes are spent at this tree...

Nice color I guess.  Normally I like a lot of the 50s/60s Disney stuff that was made for TV (and movies for that matter) but this one is so run of the mill.  I liked the outdoor scenes the most.  The sets standing in for outdoors are more than obvious.  I reckon if I were six years old and saw this on TV in 1960 (which was aired in B&W) I probably would've dug it but then I'd be wearin' my coonskin hat and ready for some Davy Crockett which would've left me disappointed sitting cross-legged on the floor at the foot of the TV, munching on some sugared cereal straight from the box.  This might've been great TV entertainment in 1960 but watching it now it's just average.  I'll pass on the other three short movies they made that year and the next starring Martin.