THE OUTSIDER (1961)

THE FILM

FILM DIRECTOR: Delbert Mann

SCREENWRITER: Stewart Stern

FILM STARS: Tony Curtis, James Franciscus, Gregory Walcott, Bruce Bennett, Vivian Nathan, Edmund Hashim, Paul Comi, Ralph Moody

COUNTRY: USA

THIS BOOK

AUTHOR: William Bradford Huie

TYPE: Biography

PUBLISHER: Panther

THIS EDITION PUBLISHED: 1961

COUNTRY: Great Britain

COVER: Paperback

THE ORIGINAL BOOK

ORIGINAL AUTHOR: As Above

YEAR FIRST PUBLISHED: 1959

ORIGINAL BOOK TITLE: The Outsider and Other Stories

NOTES

GENRE: War

WORDS: A New York Hungarian Jew playing a Native American? Why not? I would have been happy if he played a Croatian (I would be happy if anyone played a Croatian in the mainstream Hollywood of the time). Tony Curtis (perhaps one of the most underrated of all the big Hollywood stars) plays WW2 war hero, native American, Ira Hayes. The films is a straight bio but Curtis is earnest, sympathetic, and the film has a point to make. If it was made today it would be wildly different. Author, Huie, wrote many articles as a journalist (as well as a few novels) and this is a collection of four, including the title piece. His journalism hits harder than the film.

Ira Hayes was one of the six marines who became famous for having raised the U.S. flag on Mount Suribachi during the Battle of Iwo Jima in World War II. He returned home to face discomfort, hostility and lack of interest from white and native American communities. Perhaps, as a result he descended into alcoholism and died at 32.

In 1949, Hayes appeared briefly as himself in the film “Sands of Iwo Jima”, starring John Wayne. In the movie, Wayne hands the American flag to Hayes and two other marines. In the 1960 telefilm “The American”, he was played by World War II Marine veteran Lee Marvin and in the 2006 movie Flags of Our Fathers he was portrayed by Adam Beach.

Though Hayes was well known the success of the 1961 film may have led to Hayes’s story was immortalized in the song “The Ballad of Ira Hayes” by Peter LaFarge, which was subsequently covered by many artists including Johnny Cash (in 1964), Kris Kristofferson, Pete Seeger, Townes Van Zandt, and Bob Dylan.