I watched this film and began to wonder why it was not working for me. I found it depressing and the more the film entered into the domain of hanging and murder, and the dark side of Fernando Lamas's relationship with a Native American woman and its terrible consequences I sort of turned off. I liked the film years ago and I am still enchanted by Ann Blyth's performance. Howard Keel less so and comparing his performance in ' Calamity Jane, ' which is a masterpiece of film making, I found him too overbearing and heavy. Fernando Lamas I liked, but even he had lost something of his blatant charm. I finally decided it was Mervyn LeRoy ( fine for his gangster films like ' Little Caesar ' ) but not for musicals. As the first Cinemascope film musical and despite its success I found it lacking in that light touch that the genre needs. One example and no spoilers the Busby Berkeley seemed loaded with threat towards the woman involved, and for me it left a nasty taste in the mouth of female exploitation and a sort of prelude to the violence to come. I am fully aware it must have been thrilling to watch in 1954 as many in the audience would have been old enough to see it in two previous versions. That said it is worth seeing, but in my opinion the dark taste remains.