Coeur Ardent tells a relatively simple story of thwarted romance, desperate action, punishment, bravery, and eventual reconciliation, involving only American Indian characters. After Sitting Bear rejects Coeur Ardent (Blazing Heart in the American release) as a suitor for his daughter, Sun Ray (American release: Firefly), the two lovers steal another tribe’s cattle as an offering to her father. Again rebuffed and told to return the herd, Coeur Ardent is captured by the other tribe and forced to undergo a “trial” in which he has to ride off while being shot at. Although wounded, he and his horse cross a wide river, and he collapses on the shore. Sun Ray hears the shooting, reaches him, and he takes her rifle to shoot several pursuing warriors from the other tribe. Sitting Bear now accepts Coeur Ardent’s bravery and agrees to the couple’s marriage.
Largely filmed on location in the Camargue region, Coeur Ardent allows Hamman once again to exhibit his skills at horseback riding and swimming with a horse in deep water. Otherwise, it may be of interest by moving the confrontations between Sitting Bear and the lovers from outside his teepee initially to a rather spare interior and then matching the tinting of the opening shots of the lovers with the even deeper red of the concluding interior scene where the chief reconciles with the lovers.

Richard Abel