Broken Arrow (1950)

Tom Jeffords: They found a pouch on one of the wounded men, and in the pouch were three Apache scalps. So they dug a pit in the ground and they rubbed his face with the juice of the mescal plant. And they made me watch the ants come.

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Geronimo: White men pay many dollars for the scalp of an Apache.
Tom Jeffords: I know.
Geronimo: Then why did you not take his scalp?
Tom Jeffords: If I kill an Apache, it will not be for scalp or money.
Geronimo: Why not? My people and your people are at war.
Tom Jeffords: It is not my way to fight.
Geronimo: It is the way of all white eyes!
Tom Jeffords: It is not my way!
Apache warrior: You are a woman, maybe!
Tom Jeffords: It is well-known that Apaches do not take scalps either, and they are not women.

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Tom Jeffords: Cochise can't even read a map, but he and his men know every gulley, every foot of every mountain, every waterhole in Arizona. His horses can go twice as far as yours in a day, and his men can run on foot as far as a horse can run. He can't write his name, but his intelligence service knows when you got to Fort Grant and how many men you got. He stopped the Butterfield Stage from running. He stopped the U.S. Mail from going through. And for the first time in Indian history, he has all the Apaches from all the tribes fighting under one command.

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Screenwriter Albert Maltz did not receive a credit when the film was released because he was blacklisted. Instead, the script was credited to Michael Blankfort.
At 41, James Stewart was 25 years older than Debra Paget, who was barely 16 at the time of filming.
The broken arrow, which signals an end to fighting, is in fact a Blackfoot Indian symbol, not an Apache symbol. The Blackfoot are native to Montana and Alberta, Canada.
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