Yawn. Poorly Filmed Snooze Fest.

Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

Rod Cameron and the then married team of Joanne Dru and John Ireland star in Southwest Passage about an expedition to test the feasibility of using camels in the American Southwest. Purportedly after the experiment was eventually dropped and the camels turned loose on the Arizona desert descendants of them even now can be spotted to this day every now and then.Rod Cameron plays the real life character of western explorer Edward Beale who in his life also had naval service and eventually got to be Ambassador to the Hapsburg Empire. I think his life would make one fascinating movie myself, the real story. But here he's on a surveying party with camels, mules, and horse and the human participants are soldier, muleskinners and a few Arabs. Add to them a fugitive John Ireland posing as a doctor and his girlfriend Joanne Dru as someone they rescue in the desert you've got quite a mix facing the Apaches who eventually turn hostile.Ireland has just robbed a bank and bottom feeding muleskinner John Dehner recognizes him. He also recognizes he's got needs when he sees Joanne Dru. She takes a liking to Cameron. The real Beale was a married man so there's no hint of reciprocation. But Ireland is not a happy camper.There's a nice desert shootout with the Apaches which must have been something in the original 3-D this was shot in. Southwest Passage is a nice action packed most adult western where the camel experiment is just a side note. Nothing whatever to do with the really fascinating career of Edward Fitzgerald Beale.

This is a little more than a 'routine' western. It has some historical basis. The romantic couple: Lilly(Joanne Dru) and Clint(John Ireland), who have the most screen time, are quite fictional. But Edmond Beale(Rod Cameron)was quite a famous trail blazer and surveyor in his day. The supposed camel trip across Utah, New Mexico and Arizona was a mix of two of his trips. The trip where he used camels was actually from Fort Defiance, central NM, straight across central AZ to the Colorado River. This became a famous wagon trail, eventually part of US Route 66 and the Santa Fe railway.I noticed that Bactrian (2 hump) rather than dromedary(1 hump) camels were used. Historically, they were imported from Tunisia, therefore should have been dromedaries, which are the usual camel in North Africa and the Middle East. Bactrians are the usual camel in Central Asia and western China. Bactrians are notably larger and can carry or pull heavier loads, up to 1000 lbs., whereas the top limit for dromedaries is 600 lbs. and for horses and mules 300 lbs.. Although camels had various practical advantages over horses and mules in the dry rough parts of the Southwest, there was a general prejudice against substituting them for their familiar pack animals. Also, horses and mules were generally afraid of them. Getting back to the story, the threesome of Clint, Lilly, and brother Jeb are being chased by a posse, after robbing a bank of gold. Jeb is badly wounded, but they manage to lose the posse. Lilly goes to town to find a doctor, and returns with a drunkard veterinarian who says he can't do anything for Jeb. Clint bargains with him to buy his clothes and medical bag,so that the vet. can return to the east, instead of joining the camel caravan, and Clint can impersonate him when he joins the caravan. Lilly remains behind with Jeb, who eventually dies. She then finds the caravan and is reluctantly accepted. Clint's ruse is finally discovered, and he banished from the caravan after a fist fight with Beale. But, he finds a water hole, which the caravan badly needs, and helps fight off the attacking Apache. Therefore, he's accepted back into the caravan, and gives his stolen gold to Beale to return to the bank he stole it from. Beale says he can't buy his freedom from prosecution, but he's earned it...an interesting perspective.I thought Joanne was especially beautiful and charismatic. She was John Ireland's(Clint) wife at this time...Shot around Kanab, Utah. See it in color at YouTube or the expensive DVD release.

The "Southwest Passage" of the title is an government sponsored expedition across a desert in hopes of finding a shorter route to California. The trek led by Ed Beale (Rod Cameron)is also testing the feasibility of using camels as they had proved capable of traveling for long periods with little or no water in their home lands.The story opens with bank robbers Clint McDonald (John Ireland), Lilly (Joanne Dru) and her brother Jeb (Daryl Hickman) being pursued by sheriff Kenneth MacDonald and his posse. When Jeb is wounded Lilly brings a tipsy Doc Stanton (Morris Ankrum) to tend his wounds. Clint learns that the Doc is scheduled to join Beale's expedition. He decides to impersonate him and joins up with the expedition with Lilly joining him later.This picture was filmed at the end of the 50s 3D craze so most of the film is designed to show off the usual 3D "comin' at ya" effects such as rifles pointed at the screen, a bull whip cracking in your face, a pitch fork, an Indian attack etc. etc.As for the story which makes minimal use of the camels, the deception of Clint posing as a doctor takes up most of the plot. Mule skinner Matt Carroll (John Dehner) learns of the deception and blackmails Clint. Meanwhile, Clint is forced into using his "skills", as we knew he would be on the trail guide, grizzled side kick, comic relief Tall Tale (Guinn "Big Boy" Williams).Although Cameron is top billed, the story centers on the Ireland and Dru characters. Coincidently, they were married at the time. Cameron appeared in a similar role the following year in Republic's "Santa Fe Passage".Given the nature of Ireland's character, I found that the "happy" ending of the story to be a little too Hollywood. But nonetheless the overall film makes for an entertaining 75 minutes.

A routine western with a hook-it's based on tests the Army conducted using camels in the Southwest desert. Cameron, Ireland and Dru(Irelands' wife at the time)handle the acting chores competently, and the action runs smoothly.