BEST
WESTERN MOVIES
WINNING PICTURES, FAVORITE FILMS AND
HOLLYWOOD “B” ENTRIES
John Howard Reid
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Published by:
John
Howard Reid at Smashwords
Copyright (c) 2011 by John Howard Reid
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Original text copyright
2011 by John Howard Reid. All rights reserved.
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HOLLYWOOD CLASSICS 20
2011
Other Books in the “Hollywood Classics” series:
1. New Light on Movie Bests
2. “B” Movies, Bad Movies, Good Movies
3. Award-Winning Films of the 1930s
4. Movie Westerns: Hollywood Films the Wild, Wild West
5. Memorable Films of the Forties
6. Popular Pictures of the Hollywood 1940s
7. Your Colossal Main Feature Plus Full Support Program
8. Hollywood’s Miracles of Entertainment
9. Hollywood Gold: Films of the Forties and Fifties
10. Hollywood “B” Movies: A Treasury of Spills, Chills & Thrills
11. Movies Magnificent: 150 Must-See Cinema Classics
12. These Movies Won No Hollywood Awards
13. Movie Mystery & Suspense
14. America’s Best, Britain’s Finest
15. Films Famous, Fanciful, Frolicsome and Fantastic
16. Hollywood Movie Musicals
17. “Hollywood Classics” Index Books 1-16
18. More Movie Musicals
19. Success in the Cinema
20. Best Western Movies
21. Great Cinema Detectives
22. Great Hollywood Westerns
23. Science Fiction and Fantasy Cinema
24. Hollywood’s Classic Comedies
25. Hollywood Classics Title Index to All Movies Reviewed in Books 1-24
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OTHER MOVIE BOOKS by John Howard Reid
CinemaScope
One: Stupendous in ‘Scope
CinemaScope Two: 20th
Century Fox
CinemaScope 3: Hollywood Takes the Plunge
WESTERNS: A Guide to the Best (and Worst) Western Movies on DVD
British Film Entertainments on VHS and DVD
Mystery, Suspense, Film Noir and Detective Movies on DVD
Silent Films & Early Talkies on DVD
Musicals on DVD
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Table of Contents
* indicates a Gene Autry picture
# indicates a Hopalong Cassidy entry
@ indicates the Roy Rogers brand
$ indicates a John Wayne movie
+ indicates a Charles Starrett vehicle
jmb indicates a Johnny Mack Brown film
A
Adventures of Don Coyote (1947)
Arizona Bound (1941) Buck Jones
B
Buckaroo from Powder River (1947) +
C
California Outpost (see Old Los Angeles)
Clue (see Outcast of Black Mesa)
Cyclone Prairie Rangers (1944) +
D
Desert Command (see Three Musketeers)
Desert Passage (1952) Tim Holt
Down Under (see Squatter’s Daughter)
Duel on the Mississippi (1955)
F
Faro Jack (see Outlaws of the Panhandle)
Forbidden Trails (1941) Buck Jones
Fort (see Renegades of the Sage)
G
Gold Is Where You Find It (1938) Tim Holt
Gunfight at the O.K. Corral (1957)
Gunman from Bodie (1941) Buck Jones
Guns A-Blazing (see Law and Order 1932)
H
Heart of the Golden West (1942) @
High Venture (see Passage West)
J
K
L
Last Days of Boot Hill (1947) +
Law of Vengeance (see To the Last Man)
M
Man from Music Mountain (1943) @
My Darling Clementine (1946) Tim Holt
N
North of the Rio Grande (1937) #
O
Outcast of Black Mesa (1950) +
Outlaws of the Panhandle (1941) +
P
Partners of the Plains (1938) #
Power of Justice (see Beyond the Sacramento)
R
Ranger Guns West (see Three Men from Texas)
Red River Robin Hood (1942) Tim Holt
Renegade Ranger (1938) Tim Holt
Renegades of the Sage (1949) +
Return of the Frontiersman (1950)
Return of the Plainsman (see Phantom Stockman)
Rhythm on the Ranch (see Rootin’ Tootin’ Rhythm)
Rider from Tucson (1950) Tim Holt
Riders of the Timberline {Timberlands} (1941) #
Rio Grande Patrol (1950) Tim Holt
Rocky Rhodes (1934) Buck Jones
Rootin’ Tootin’ Rhythm (1937) *
S
Secret of the Wastelands (1941) #
Sentiment and Song (see Song of the Prairie)
South of the Chisholm Trail (1947) +
Spoilers of the Range (1939) +
T
Texas Legionnaires (see Man from Sonora)
Texas Rangers Ride Again (1940)
They Died With Their Boots On (1941)
Tomahawk Trail (see Iroquois Trail)
Toughest Man in Arizona (1952)
Twilight on the Trail (1941) #
U
V
W
War of the Wildcats (see In Old Oklahoma)
Y
Index to all 66 Hopalong Cassidy films (see Hidden Gold)
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Richard Martin (Don Coyote), Frances Rafferty (Maggie), Marc Cramer (Dave), Val Carlo (Sancho), Benny Bartlett (Ted), Frank Fenton (Big Foot), Byron Foulger (Felton).
Director: REGINALD LE BORG. Screenplay: Bob Williams, Harold Tarshis. Original story: Bob Williams. Photography: Fred Jackman. Film editor: Lynn Harrison. Music score: David Chudnow. Producers: Buddy Rogers, Ralph Cohn.
Copyright 9 May 1947 by Comet Productions. Released through United Artists. No New York opening. U.S. release: 9 May 1947. U.K. release: December 1950. Australian release: 9 March 1951. Aust. distributor: Universal-International. 5,964 feet. 65 minutes.
COMMENT: This C-grade western is very short on action and has virtually nothing to recommend it: a few desultory songs, a couple of poorly-staged fights, pedestrian direction, poverty row sets, unattractive photography. The plot has heroine Frances Rafferty (who deserves more inspired material than this) enlist the aid of the good Don to save her ranch from the attacks of a band of outlaws.
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Hugh O’Brian (Jim Sinclair), John Mills (Wing Commander Hayes), Nigel Green (Karl Bekker), Tom Nardini (John Henry), Adrienne Corri (Fay Carter), Ronald Howard (Hugo Copp), Charles Malinda (Sampson), Honey Wamala (Mr Oyondi), Charles Hayes (veterinary), Stephen Kikumu (Peter), Ali Twaha (Turk), Mohammed Abdullah (witch doctor), Hayley Mills (girl at airport).
Director: ANDREW MARTON. Script: Andy White. Photography: Paul Beeson. Color: Eastman Color. Editor: Henry Richardson. Art director: Maurice Fowler. Special effects: Thomas (Nobby) Clark. Music composed and conducted by Malcolm Arnold. Assistant directors: Ted Sturgis and Ivo Nightingale. Make-up: Eleanor Jones. Hair styles: Betty Glasow. Wardrobe: Duncan McPhee. Sound recording: Gerry Turner. Filmed in Kenya, Africa. Set continuity: Doreen Soan. Casting director: Irene Howard. Production secretary: Midge Warnes. Camera operator: Harry Gillam. Still photographs: John Jay. Supervising electrician: Tom Heathcoat. Property master: John Poyner. Executive producer: Ivan Tors. Distributor: Paramount. Production company: Vantors. Producer: Andrew Marton. Associate producer: John Pellatt. Production manager: Derek Parr.
Copyright 2 June 1967 by Vantors Films. An Ivan Tors Production, released by Paramount. New York opening at RKO neighborhood theaters: 12 July 1967. U.S. release: 2 June 1967. U.K. release: 16 July 1967. Australian release: 5 January 1968. Sydney opening on a double bill at the Capitol (ran one week). 9,818 feet. 109 minutes.
SYNOPSIS: Hoping to develop wild game ranching in Kenya as an alternative to cattle ranching, Howard Hayes, an English settler, engages two Texan cowboys, Jim Sinclair and John Henry, to rope and herd the animals. Cattle rancher Karl Bekker opposes the scheme, fearing that his cattle will be infected by diseases spread by the wild animals.
VIEWER’S GUIDE: Okay for all.
COMMENT: With a banal script that does not miss a single cliché and has trite dialogue and “worthy” sentiments to match, Andrew Marton cannot make much of this film, even with actual location filming. The actors come off poorly, and the animals fare even worse, being mainly used to cover up action where inept direction has left an untoward gap. There are one or two moderately exciting moments, and the film is in color. Otherwise, it’s a bore.
OTHER VIEWS: Producer-Director Ivan Tors, who with such TV series as Flipper and Daktari has made animals his livestock in trade, combines two supposedly potent ingredients into one-wide-screen epic: The Dark Continent and the Wild West… Tors, a director of the World Wildlife Fund, obviously hoped to make a film that would entertain as well as instruct. This one does neither. Africa — Texas Style! has not enough of the real Africa, less of Texas, and no style at all. It patronises the natives, shows the beasts in badly edited shots that unconvincingly mix footage of wild lions and tame humans. Tors has even included the ancient anthropomorphism of a pet monkey guzzling beer — which only goes to prove that successful films with monkeys in them can still be counted on the fingers of one foot.
— Time.
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Buck Jones (Buck Roberts), Tim McCoy (Parson McCall), Raymond Hatton (Sandy Hopkins), Luana Walters (Ruth Masters), Dennis Moore (Joe), Kathryn Sheldon (Aunt Miranda), Tris Coffin (Steve Taggart), Horace Murphy (Red), I. Stanford Jolley (idler with straw), Ben Corbett (Judge Melford), Slim Whitaker, Gene Alsace, Jack Daly, Hal Price, Augie Gomez, and “Silver”.
Director: SPENCER GORDON BENNET. Screenplay: Jess Bowers. Original story: Oliver Drake. Photography: Harry Neumann. Film editor: Carl Pierson. Art director: Vin Taylor. Music composed and directed by Edward J. Kay. Assistant director: William Drake. Production manager: C. J. Bigelow. Sound: Karl Zint. Western Electric Sound System. Producer: Scott R. Dunlap.
Copyright 19 July 1941 by Monogram Pictures Corp. U.S. release: 9 July 1941. No New York showcase. Australian release through British Empire Films: 12 February 1942. 6 reels. 5,263 feet. 58 minutes.
SYNOPSIS: Marshal Roberts is called in to clean up Mesa City.
NOTES: This was the first of the famous “Rough Riders” series, the following films (also starring Jones, McCoy and Hatton) being The Gunman from Bodie, Forbidden Trails, Below the Border, Ghost Town Law, Down Texas Way, Riders of the West and West of the Law. The series came to an end when McCoy returned to active duty (as a lieutenant colonel) in the U.S. Army. Jones made one more film, Dawn on the Great Divide, before his tragic death on 30 November 1942 from burns received in the Cocoanut Grove fire. Bennet directed the first two films, Robert N. Bradbury the third, and Howard Bretherton all the rest. Arizona Bound was shot in 7 days at a negative cost between $60,000 and $70,000. Shooting title: The Rough Riders.
VIEWERS’ GUIDE: Okay for all.
COMMENT: For a Monogram “B”-western, this Rough Riders saga has been produced on a comparatively lavish scale. True, the apparent shortage of action is a handicap until it becomes plain that the plot has been constructed on the Hopalong Cassidy model with minor skirmishes between the heroes and the villain and his henchmen until the final climactic shoot-out which sees the Rough Riders racing for the town, the director using running inserts of our heroes cross-cut with the baddies who, barricaded in the saloon, are shooting it out with the honest townsfolk!
Tristram Coffin makes an effective villain and has a nice team of henchmen to support him. Buck Jones comes into this one right from the first shot at the start of the film proper (after some establishing long shots), but Hatton (playing a horse-trader in this one) and McCoy (doing his customary parson stunt — the scene with all the bad types lined up against a wall smilingly singing “Bury Me on the Long Prairie” with its deft pans along the forced-to-smile faces recalls a sequence that John Huston used some years later in Beat the Devil) come in after the film is well under way.
Luana Walters is only a passable heroine, while Dennis Moore has a small part as her fiancé. Kathryn Sheldon seems to have been thrown into the film for comic relief, but fortunately there is very little of this and even Hatton forgoes most of his usual slapstick.
Although the plot is familiar, it is neatly constructed, and the dialogue is not as corny nor as laden with clichés as some of these films.
Production values are remarkable with some surprisingly fluid direction and deft film editing and very attractive photography. The exterior locations are appealing and there are plenty of costumed extras milling about. Kay’s music score tends to be monotonous and repetitious but at least it’s a cut above the amateurish efforts of Frank Sanucci.
Altogether, with this film the Rough Riders were off to a most auspicious start!
OTHER VIEWS: See Forbidden Trails in this book.
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Ray Corrigan (Crash Corrigan), John King (Dusty King), Max Terhune (Alibi Terhune), Nell O’Day (Dorrie Willard), Riley Hill [Roy Harris] (Ernie Willard), Charles King (Tim Douglas), Kermit Maynard (Strike), Jack Ingram (Sheriff Denver), Forrest Taylor (Uncle Larry Meadows), Steve Clark (Jake, the stage driver), Carl Mathews (Ace), Slim Harkey (Panhandle), Slim Whitaker (Red), Frank Ellis (Dan, the stage shotgun), Stranley Price (Tex Laughlin), Eddie Dean (henchman), Victor Adamson, Herman Hack, Milburn Morante, Jimmy Aubrey (barflies), Richard Cramer (Joe, the bartender), and Elmer.
Director: S. ROY LUBY. Screenplay: Arthur Hoerl. Story: Oliver Drake. Film editor: S. Roy Luby. Photography: Robert Cline. Music director: Frank Sanucci. Song: “Where the Grass Grows High in the Mountains” (King) by Rudy Sooter. Production manager: William L. Nolte. Sound recording: Lyle Willey. Associate producers: Richard Ross, Anna Bell Weeks. Producer: George W. Weeks.
Not copyright 1942 by Range Busters, Inc. Released through Monogram Pictures Corporation: 4 September 1942. 58 minutes.
SYNOPSIS: The unusually complicated story of this 16th entry in the series, is a little difficult to follow. But if you pay close attention, you’ll just manage to keep up with it. Not that you’ll bother, because the whole affair, what with a loose talking dummy (in both senses of the word loose) and a hero with a bent for nasty practical pranks, is in many ways so childish, it’s not really worth the effort. In brief, The Range Busters are enlisted to ferret out a gang of highwaymen who specialize in stealing Wells Fargo cash boxes from the Arizona stagecoach.
COMMENT: Of mild interest for rabid fans of Corrigan and company, this Range Busters entry, filmed against the serviceable but somewhat lackluster scenery of the Corrigan Ranch, does hold out three or four joys for the general viewer in the acting department. It’s good to see Kermit Maynard filling the shoes of a bad guy and it’s always great to find Charles King up to his old tricks. Another favorite heavy, Jack Ingram, can be spotted in a smallish but odd part as the local sheriff. But the real flavor of this entry is provided by Steve Clark who really revels in his role as a corrupt stage driver. And for once, Steve has the best lines in the movie!
The action spots are directed at a fast clip (with running inserts yet!) and, as inferred above, there’s probably enough fast riding and quick-on-the-draw shooting to satisfy the inveterate fans. As usual, Mr King is handed a couple of songs, one of which he renders upside down. And also as usual, Mr Terhune and his poorly animated dummy (who receives an inordinate number of close-ups) waste a fair amount of our time.
DEATHLESS DIALOGUE. Corrupt stage driver (mildly chiding the leader of a group of masked bandits who has his eyes set on the cash box): “Say, this isn’t the spot where you were supposed to hold us up.”
Bandit’s quick-as-a-flash retort: “I liked this spot better.”
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William “Wild Bill” Elliott (Wild Bill Hickok), Evelyn Keyes (Lynn Perry), Dub Taylor (“Cannonball”), Frank LaRue (Jeff Adams), Don Beddoe (Warden McKay), Bradley Page (Cord Crowley), Norman Willis (Nelson), and Steve Clark, Harry Bailey, Art Mix, George McKay, Bud Osborne, Blackjack Ward, Jack Low, Olin Francis, Clem Horton, Tex Cooper, Ned Glass, John Dilson, Jack Clifford.
Director: LAMBERT HILLYER. Original screenplay: Luci Ward. Photography: George Meehan. Film editor: James Sweeney. Western Electric Sound System. Producer: Leon Barsha.
Copyright 7 November 1940 by Columbia Pictures Corp. U.S. release: 14 November 1940. No New York opening. 6 reels. 58 minutes.
U.K. release title: Power of Justice.
VIEWER’S GUIDE: Okay for all.
COMMENT: It’s astonishing what a stranglehold Luci Ward had on the writing of “B”-picture westerns. Why she was employed is a typical Hollywood piece of illogicality, since her knowledge of the frontier is nil, her dialogue is stilted and her plots are merely variations of well-worn themes with as many clichés as there are leaves in a hen-party teapot.
This one is no exception. It emerges as a pretty mediocre Wild Bill Hickok western, with plenty of dialogue and not overmuch action. Admittedly, the climax starts promisingly with Mr Hickok making a most spectacular entrance, but, alas, the rest of it is lame. Dub Taylor’s comic relief is chiefly concerned with a running gag about a cow-hide vest that is not the least bit funny.
Although Evelyn Keyes figures in a fair bit of footage, her fans will be hard put to recognise her. Even her personality is quite colorless. On the evidence of this film it would be hard to believe she had a Hollywood future.
One of our favorite villains, gravel-voiced Norman Willis, has only a secondary henchman role. The chief villains themselves are an undistinguished lot.
Lambert Hillyer’s direction is dull. Though competent, it does not exhibit any traces of his customary flair and style. Other production credits are okay.
OTHER VIEWS: Standard Saturday matinee fare.
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Kirk Douglas (Deakins), Dewey Martin (Boone), Elizabeth Threatt (Teal Eye), Arthur Hunnicutt (Zeb), Buddy Baer (Romaine), Steven Geray (Jourdonnais), Hank Worden (Poordevil), Jim Davis (Streak), Henri Letondal (Ladadie), Robert Hunter (Chouquette), Booth Colman (Pascal), Paul Frees (MacMasters), Frank De Kova (Moleface), Guy Wilkerson (Longface), Don Beddoe (mule buyer), and Barbara Hawks, George Wallace, Max Wagner, Sam Ash, Frank Lackteen, Jay Novello, William Self.
Narrated by Arthur Hunnicutt.
Produced and directed by HOWARD HAWKS. Written by Dudley Nichols, based on the novel by A. B. Guthrie, Jr. Photographed by Russell Harlan. Edited by Christian Nyby. Art directors: Albert D’Agostino and Perry Ferguson. Music composed and conducted by Dimitri Tiomkin. Music co-ordinator: Constantin Bakaleinikoff. Music editor: Richard Harris. French lyrics. Gordon Clark. Casting assistant: Harvey Clermont. Sound effects: Walter G. Elliott. Sound recording: Phil Brigandi, Clem Portman. Set decorations: Darrell Silvera and William Stevens. 2nd unit director: Arthur Rosson. Costumes: Dorothy Jeakins. Make-up: Mel Berns, Don Cash. Hair styles: Larry Germain. Special effects: Donald Steward. Assistant director: William McGarry. RCA Sound System. Associate producer: Edward Lasker. Filmed in Grand Teton National Park.
A Winchester Pictures Production, distributed by RKO Radio. New York opening at the Criterion: 19 August 1952. Copyright 29 July 1952 by RKO Radio Pictures, Inc. U.S. release: August 1952. U.K. release: 8 December 1952. Australian release: 12 February 1953. 122 minutes.
SYNOPSIS: Two young Kentuckians and their frontiersman uncle are hired by a riverboat captain to guide his keelboat more than a thousand miles from St Louis into Blackfoot Indian territory.
NOTES: Arthur Hunnicutt was nominated for an Academy Award for Supporting Actor, losing to Anthony Quinn in Viva Zapata!
Russell Harlan was nominated for an Oscar for his black-and-white Cinematography, losing to Robert Surtees for The Bad and the Beautiful.
The producer wishes to thank the National Parks Service for photographic assistance in Grand Teton National Park.
Guthrie’s 1947 novel was extremely well received, both critically and commercially. Its sequel The Way West (1949) won a Pulitzer prize.
VIEWER’S GUIDE: Suitable for all.
COMMENT: Beautifully photographed epic about pioneering up the old Missouri, somewhat reminiscent of the later Far Horizons, though this is much more exciting and spectacular. Dud Nichols’ screenplay, however, is far from satisfying. It’s not just that the characters are one-dimensional, it’s that they don’t seem to have any dimension at all! We know as much about the characters in the first 12 minutes as we do in the next 120! Composer Tiomkin and cinematographer Harlan seem to be the only people striving to give the story some dramatic impact.
OTHER VIEWS: Although both Joseph McBride and Tony Thomas give some interesting background information on this film in their respective studies of Kirk Douglas (McBride notes that Douglas would not accept the part unless his role was built up at Dewey Martin’s expense), the best critique of the film is found in The Films of Howard Hawks by Donald C. Willis. A comparison is made between the original book and the film. Once it gets started, in Chapter 23, it’s a good book, but Hawks’ film never does get started. “It’s partly a picturization of the dullest section of the book and partly its own concoction... The film makes little use of its epic spaces. Instead, nature dwarfs the movie and its concerns. In Guthrie’s book, distances in time and space help create a deep sense of kinship between people. In the movie, the setting is just a scenic backdrop, well-employed in shots of the fur trappers pulling the keelboat up the river or of Indians riding along the shore on horseback... Some of the names are the same as in the book, but Hawks and Nichols discarded virtually all its characters... Deakins is pared of his religious musings and his significance as a link between civilization and wilderness. But the difference between the book’s Boone Caudill and Dewey Martin’s version is crucial... The narrator has to come to the story’s aid near the end to explain what’s happening. The narration tries to supply what the movie doesn’t, a real sense of comradeship between Boone and Deakins. Instead of developing that sense, the film shoves one of the book’s peripheral concerns — the fur company’s attempts to sabotage Jourdonnais’ expedition — into stage center. The script might better have forgotten all about plot and been a documentary of men and keelboats and sky and river, but it keeps dwindling into conventional heroes-and-villains melodrama.”
To get back to McBride, one of the things he does rightly point out is that one of the highlights of the film is an early scene in a tavern in which Douglas sings “Whisky Leave Me Alone” and then gets embroiled in a fight which is unexpectedly — and hilariously — terminated when Douglas is knocked cold with a metal bar tray.
P.S. In my French period, I wrote for the short-lived Cinéma dans Marseilles. The above comments are translated from my original Movies in Marseilles review. I have since read the book. An enthralling experience, The Big Sky is one of the ten most gripping novels I’ve ever read. It has a feeling for the frontier and the motivations of the early 19th century pioneers that is absolutely fascinating. Unfortunately, little if any of this powerfully descriptive and interpretative material is captured in the movie. Whilst the picture is interesting enough in its own right — especially when the scenery is allowed to dominate — it bears such a peripheral relationship to the book that its connection is tenuous enough to be disregarded. One good thing is that seeing the movie will in no way spoil your enjoyment of the book. (Of course if you read the book first, you’re apt to be mighty disappointed by its picturisation).
— J.H.R.
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Roddy McDowall (Jimmy), Jeff Donnell (Sally), Lyn Thomas (June), Gordon Jones (Jocko), Tom Greenway (Rocky), Robert Shayne (Dixon), Ted Hecht (Bert), Lyle Talbot (1st logger).
Director: JEAN YARBROUGH. Original screenplay: Warren Wilson. Photography: William Sickner. Supervising film editor: Leonard W. Herman. Art director: David Milton. Set decorator: Ray Boltz, Jr. Music director: Edward J. Kay. Set continuity: Ilona Vas. Assistant to the producer: Wesley Barry. Sound recording: Tom Lambert. Western Electric Sound System. Associate producers: Roddy McDowall, Ace Herman. Producer: Lindsley Parsons. A Lindsley Parsons Production.
Copyright 10 September 1950 by Monogram Pictures Corp. No New York opening. U.S. release: 10 September 1950. U.K. release through Associated British-Pathé 15 January 1951. Never theatrically released in Australia. 7 reels. 73 minutes.
SYNOPSIS: Super-keen youth gains experience in a logging camp.
VIEWER’S GUIDE: I can’t understand the Oz censor’s Parental Recommendation for this one. Usually the PR errs very much on the side of liberality, but this one cautions parents against “some objectionable scenes.’’ I can’t imagine what scenes were considered unacceptable as I would rate Big Timber as Highly Recommended for All without any reservations whatever. Certainly the British censor agrees. His certificate is “U” for Universal Exhibition.
COMMENT: This engaging semi-documentary is an unusual production from Monogram. Well produced, obviously photographed in a real logging camp, with a script that allows plenty of opportunities for realistic conflict and action at the same time as providing easily assimilated and often fascinating information, Big Timber is a credit to all concerned. The players are personable and interesting, the backgrounds rivet the attention, and the work by the usually slightly below par Monogram crew is nothing short of outstanding. It’s hard to credit that the always so reliably pedestrian director Jean Yarbrough has risen so nobly to the challenge of a well-crafted script and outdoor locations. And though it seems a long way from Hellzapoppin to Big Timber for screenwriter Warren Wilson, he has managed the transition from outrageous fantasy to enthralling slice-of-life with easeful artistry.
OTHER VIEWS: Logging and lumberjacking have always been a natural subject for the big screen. It’s hard to go wrong with such obvious elements of conflict and such obviously fascinating natural backgrounds. Films like Come and Get It, The Big Trees, Valley of the Giants, God’s Country and the Woman, Guns of the Timberland, Tall Timbers, Lucky Corrigan and Men of the Timberland immediately come to mind. Despite its modest though unstinting budget and its admirable lack of pretension, Big Timber is exciting and realistic enough to join the best of these. Roddy McDowall hands out a most sympathetic portrait of the eager youth, whilst the two girls are expertly contrasted by tomboyish Jeff Donell and the more feminine Lyn Thomas. Gordon Jones does a fine job as the heavy. The director and his cameraman make excellent use of the lumberjack locations.
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Buster Crabbe (William Bonney alias Billy the Kid), Al St John (Fuzzy), Bud McTaggart (Jeff Walker), Anne Jeffreys (Sally Crane), Glenn Strange (Stanton), Walter McGrail (Judge McConnell), Ted Adams (Sheriff Masters), Milton Kibbee (Judge Clark), Jack Ingram (Red Berton), George Chesebro (Deputy Curley), Eddie Phillips (Dale Evans, the stage driver), Budd Buster (Montana, the fake Fuzzy), Richard Cramer (Gus, the bartender), Hank Bell, Roy Bucko, Horace B. Carpenter, Jack Evans, Oscar Gahan, Pascale Perry, Jack Tornek, Jack Kinney, Herman Hack, Jim Mason (barflies), Wally West (Pete, the fake Billy), Cactus Mack, Carl Mathews, Curley Dresden, Augie Gomez, Art Dillard, Bert Dillard, Jimmy Aubrey (henchmen), Ralph Bucko (Steve Evans, the Mesa City sheriff), Chick Hannon (townsman), Ray Henderson (Charley, the fake Jeff Walker).
Director: SAM NEWFIELD (using his “Sherman Scott” pseudonym). Screenplay: Joseph O’Donnell. Photography: Jack Greenhalgh. Film editor: Holbrook N. Todd. Music: Johnny Lange, Lew Porter. Stunts: Carl Mathews, Wally West. Production manager: Bert Sternbach. Assistant director: Melville De Lay. Sound recording: Hans Weeren. Producer: Sigmund Neufeld.
Copyright 30 January 1942 by Producers Releasing Corporation. U.S. release: 27 February 1942. 59 minutes.
SYNOPSIS: Billy the Kid and his buddies are mysteriously rescued from jail.
COMMENT: One of the best of the Buster Crabbe entries, this one not only packs a fair wallop in its action sequences, but tells an ingeniously interesting little story as well. As a bonus the plot also provides opportunities for some of our favorite people including Glenn Strange (wearing a suit in this one and making a good job of the chief bad guy), Jack Ingram and George Chesebro (as two of Strange’s henchmen) and Walter McGrail as a viciously corrupt judge. We also like Ted Adams as the fair-minded sheriff and Anne Jeffreys as the lass in the case. And even Mr St John is tolerable.
Considering the fast pace at which the movie was churned out, Mr Newfield/Scott’s able direction deserves an unusually high mark. Also meriting praise — the richly-textured photography of Mr Greenhalgh, which is often surprisingly attractive.
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William Boyd (Hopalong Cassidy), Russell Hayden (Lucky Jenkins), Andy Clyde (California Carlson), Victor Jory (Henry Logan), Morris Ankrum (Dan Forbes), Frances Gifford (Helen Forbes), Ethel Wales (Aunt Jennifer Forbes), Tom Tyler (Jim Yager), Hal Taliaferro (Ed Stone), Jack Rockwell (Henry Weaver), Britt Wood (Lafe Willis), Hank Worden (wagon driver), Edward Earle (Banker Stevens), Hank Bell (liveryman), Curley Dresden (bank guard), Al Haskell (gambler), Chuck Morrison (wagon driver in brawl), Ted Wells (henchman).
Director: DERWIN ABRAHAMS. Original story and screenplay by J. Benton Cheney. Based on characters created by Clarence E. Mulford. Sound mixer: Charles Althouse. Art director: Lewis J. Rachmil. Film editor: Carrol Lewis. Photographed by Russell Harlan. Set decorator: Emile Kuri. Song, “Is This Our Last Night Together” (Gifford) by Sam Coslow and Pauline Bouchard. Associate producer: Joseph W. Engel. Producer: Harry Sherman. A Harry Sherman Production.
Copyright 18 April 1941 by Paramount Pictures Inc. No recorded New York opening. U.S. release: 18 April 1941. Australian release: 2 October 1941. 6 reels. 5,628 feet. 62 minutes.
SYNOPSIS: Despite the vigilance of the Border Vigilantes of Silver City, a frontier mining community, a band of outlaws succeed in robbing the miners frequently and systematically. This is because Henry Logan, highly respected leader of the Vigilantes, is also the leader of the bandits. It is his purpose to scare the miners out of the vicinity and take possession of the mines for himself and his lieutenants, Jim Yager and Lafe Willis.
Very soon after a raid by the bandits, Dan Forbes, one of the miners, comes to Logan and tells him he feels sure that the bandits are able to pull their depredations because some one in the ranks of the Vigilantes tips them off. Pretending interest, Logan asks him if he suspects anyone. Forbes says no but, as a precaution, has sent to Bar 20, in Arizona, for his old pal Hopalong Cassidy to come up and have a look around.
Forbes is wounded by Yager in a street fight, and is taken home in serious condition, where he is nursed by his daughter, Helen, and his sister known as Aunt Jenifer. Logan sends his henchman Stone out to prevent Cassidy from reaching town.
NOTES: Number 34 of the 66-picture series.
VIEWERS’ GUIDE: Okay for all.
COMMENT: Despite the cast, this is not one of the more interesting of the Hopalong Cassidy cycle, being rather long on talk and low comedy relief, with some action sequences that are not particularly well-managed by director Abrahams, here making his solo debut after many years as an assistant director on the series.
OTHER VIEWS: One that stands a bit below the high-water mark but well above the low-water mark is Border Vigilantes, a 1941 picture whose all-star western cast includes Andy Clyde (Gabby Hayes’ successor), Victor Jory, Frances Gifford, Russell Hayden and Tom Tyler. Like most Hoppies, it follows a simple formula — slow beginning, a few minor skirmishes, then building to an all-out climax.
— David Zinman in Saturday Afternoon at the Bijou.
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Charles Starrett (Steve Lacy/The Durango Kid), Smiley Burnette (himself), Eve Miller (Molly Parnell), Forrest Taylor (Pop Ryland), Paul Campbell (Clint Ryland), Doug Coppin (Tommy Ryland), Phillip Morris (Sheriff Barnell), Casey MacGregor (Dave Ryland), Ted Adams (Les Driscoll), Ethan Laidlaw (Ben Trask), Frank McCarroll (McCall), The Cass Country Boys, Kermit Maynard.
Director: RAY NAZARRO. Original screenplay: Norman Hall. Photography: George F. Kelley. Film editor: Paul Borofsky. Art director: Charles Clague. Set decorator: David Montrose. Producer: Colbert Clark.
Copyright 14 October 1947 by Columbia Pictures Corp. U.S. release: 14 October 1947. No New York opening. No U.K. release. Australian release: 19 August 1948. Sydney opening at the Capitol on the bottom of a triple bill with Louis K.O’s Walcott in Return Bout and Mr Reckless. 5,034 feet. 55 minutes.
SYNOPSIS: When the nephew of an outlaw refuses to take part in his uncle’s scheme to counterfeit government bonds, his uncle plans to murder him.
NOTES: Starrett’s 93rd of his 132 starring westerns.
VIEWERS’ GUIDE: Okay for all.
COMMENT: A minor Durango Kid entry, though it does boast plenty of action. There’s even a couple of exciting running inserts, though most of the chases are filmed by a rapidly panning camera from fixed positions.
Aside from the action, however, Nazarro’s direction is static. In fact his pedestrian handling of dialogue scenes not only emphasizes the script’s clichés but gives the impression the film is overweighted with talk.
Of course the dialogue is leavened not only with action but songs and comedy routines. The former are pleasant yet forgettable, whilst Mr Burnette’s foolery is at least bearable.
A third-string support cast doesn’t help.
Production values are minor.
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William Boyd (Hopalong Cassidy), Jimmy Ellison (Johnny Nelson), Muriel Evans (Linda McHenry), George Hayes (Shanghai), Chester Conklin (Sandy McQueen), Al Bridge (Sam Porter), Hank Mann (Tom), Willie Fung (Wong), Howard Lang (Buck Peters), Al Hill (Slade), John Merton (Arizona), Jim Mason (Hoskins), Chill Wills (boss) and the Avalon Boys, John St Polis.
Director: HOWARD BRETHERTON. Screenplay: Doris Schroeder, Vernon Smith. Adapted by Doris Schroeder from the 1928 novel Hopalong Cassidy’s Protégé by Clarence Edward Mulford. Photography: Archie Stout. Film editor: Edward Schroeder. Art director: Lewis J. Rachmil. Songs by Tot Seymour and Vee Lawnhurst. Sound recording: Earl Sitar. Associate producer: George Green. Produced by Harry Sherman for Harry Sherman Productions. A Paramount release, presented by Adolph Zukor.
Copyright 6 March 1936 by Paramount Pictures, Inc. Not noticed in The New York Times. U.S. release: 6 March 1936. Australian release: 15 July 1936. 7 reels. 5,994 feet. 66 minutes.
SYNOPSIS: Hopalong Cassidy returns to the Bar-20 Ranch after selling some cattle for Buck Peters, to find that his young friend, Johnny Nelson, has been drinking and gambling with undesirable associates. When Peters refuses him a loan, Johnny goes off to town in a huff, and starts drinking with his new friends, including Sam Porter and Old Shanghai. Hearing that Cassidy is back with a big bank-roll, they drug Johnny, take his neckerchief, and set out to rob Peters. Poking a pistol through a crack in the door, they throw Johnny’s neckerchief in and command Peters to wrap up the money Cassidy brought. Peters fills the neckerchief with old papers, and shoots at the retreating robbers. They return fire, wounding Peters.
The foiled bandits wake Johnny up and tell him they want the money. Johnny tries to fight his way out, but is overpowered. Porter tells Shanghai to take Johnny into the hills and shoot him. Shanghai makes Johnny dig his own grave.
NOTES: Number 4 of the 66-picture series.
VIEWERS’ GUIDE: Okay for all.
COMMENT: As will be seen from the Synopsis, this entry is more interesting for its unusual casting than for its action which is lamentably short. In a remarkable departure from his later “Gabby” characterizations, George Hayes plays a villainous henchman, a cold-blooded murderer with absolutely no scruples. Yet in one scene, in which he pretends to be a drunk, he employs the same comic style and mannerisms he was later to use as Hoppy’s sidekick.
Silent slapstick comedian Chester Conklin is here seen as the sheriff, would you believe? And the later star of all the Francis movies Chill Wills provides musical interludes with the Avalon Boys!
Contributing to the entertainment, Howard Bretherton’s direction is comparatively stylish, though his efforts are somewhat undermined by Edward Schroeder’s peculiar editing style with its odd lapses in continuity. (Of course it may be the other way around: Schroeder did his best with incompetently shot and truncated material).
OTHER VIEWS: Actually, Hayes first played his popular “Windy” in the third Cassidy entry, Bar 20 Rides Again. So it’s doubly odd to find him as a featured heavy in this excursion.
— G.A.
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William Boyd (Hopalong Cassidy), Russell Hayden (Lucky Jenkins), Frank Darien (Pappy), Nora Lane (Nora Blake), Robert Fiske (Clay Allison), John Elliott (Tom Dillon), Margaret Marquis (Mary Dillon), Gertrude W. Hoffman (Ma Caffrey), Carleton Young (Jeff Caffrey), Gordon Hart (Judge Belcher), Edward Cassidy (Sheriff Hawley), Jim Toney (cowhand).
Director: LESLEY SELANDER. Screenplay: Norman Houston. Based on the 1929 novel Me and Shorty by Clarence E. Mulford. Photography: Russell Harlan. Film editor: Sherman A. Rose. Art director: Lewis J. Rachmil. Assistant directors: Derwin Abrahams, Theodore Joos. Sound recording: Earl Sitar. Producer: Harry Sherman. A Harry Sherman Production, presented by Adolph Zukor.
Copyright 25 February 1938 by Paramount Pictures, Inc. New York opening at the Central, on a double bill with Taming the Wild: 27 March 1938. U.S. release: 25 February 1938. Australian release: 21 July 1938. 6 reels. 5,331 feet. 59 minutes.
SYNOPSIS: Hopalong Cassidy, boss of the Bar 20 ranch, rides down the “Camino Real”, or King’s Highway, of the old New Mexico cattle country, in response to an urgent message from his lifelong sweetheart, Nora Blake, who is in serious trouble. Before he and his saddlemates can reach her ranch, they are halted by Clay Allison, a powerful cattle-rustler who is in almost complete control of Alamogordo district and wants to extend his holdings by seizing Nora’s cattle and driving her out of the country. Seeing Cassidy as a menace to these plans, he has him arrested on a trumped-up charge. Hopalong and his Bar 20 pals bluff their way out to freedom and succeed in reaching Nora’s ranch, where they learn that the rustler-king has already murdered Tom Dillon, Nora’s foreman.
NOTES: Number 16 of the 66-picture series.
COMMENT: Well-photographed (Russell Harlan) but lifeless Hopalong Cassidy. All the action occurs in the space of two or three minutes at the finale. Not that it’s particularly exciting in itself or very vigorously staged anyway! The rest of the film is very, very dull.
OTHER VIEWS: At least Cassidy of Bar 20, unimpressive as the feature itself might be, made a fine trailer. Running a mere 137 feet (that’s exactly 1½ minutes), this preview is much the usual “thriller”, containing plenty of action — fast-riding cowboys, gunplay, comedy and romance.
To quote Paramount publicity: “Opens with thrilling scene of cowboys riding across the range... amusing scene as Cassidy and Darien are held up by Margaret Marquis... dramatic scene between Nora Lane and Boyd... thrilling interlude as Boyd threatens men in store... cowboys riding to the round-up of killers... introduction of all players in characteristic poses... and many other exciting scenes.”
— G.A.
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James Stewart (Wyatt Earp), Edward G. Robinson (Carl Schurz), Richard Widmark (Captain Thomas Archer), Carroll Baker (Deborah Wright), Karl Malden (Captain Oscar Wessels), Sal Mineo (Red Shirt), Dolores Del Rio (Spanish woman), Ricardo Montalban (Little Wolf), Gilbert Roland (Dull Knife), Arthur Kennedy (Doc Holliday), Patrick Wayne (Second Lieutenant Scott), Elizabeth Allen (Miss Guinevere Plantagenet), John Carradine (Major Jeff Blair), Victor Jory (Tall Tree), Judson Pratt (Mayor Dog Kelly), Mike Mazurki (First Sergeant Stanislaus Wichowsky), Ken Curtis (Homer), George O’Brien (Major Braden), Shug Fisher (trail boss), Carmen D’Antonio (Pawnee woman), Walter Baldwin (Deborah’s uncle), Nancy Hseuh (Little Bird), Chuck Roberson (trail hand), Many Muleson (medicine man), John Qualen (Svenson), Sean McClory (Dr O’Carberry), Walter Reed (Lieutenant Peterson), James Flavin (sergeant of the guard), Stephanie Epper, Mary Statler, Jean Epper, Donna Hall (entertainers), Ben Johnson (Plumtree), Harry Carey Jr (Smith), Bing Russell (telegrapher), John McKee, Dan Borzage, Dan Carr, James O’Hara, David Miller, Ted Mapes (troopers), Denver Pyle (Henry), Major Sam Harris (townsman), Charles Seel (newspaper publisher), Louise Montana (woman), Philo McCullough (man), William Henry (infantry captain), Carleton Young (secretary to Schurz), Willis Bouchey (colonel), Lee Bradley, Frank Bradley (Cheyenne braves), Nanomba “Moonbeam” Morton (Running Deer), Chuck Hayward, Dean Smith, David Humphreys Miller (troopers), Dan M. White (saloon patron), Kevin O’Neal.
Director: JOHN FORD. Screenplay: James R. Webb, from the 1953 novel by Mari Sandoz. Photographer (Technicolor, Super Panavision 70): William H. Clothier. 2nd unit director: Ray Kellogg. Art director: Richard Day. Set decorator: Darrell Silvera. Film editor: Otho Lovering. Music composed and conducted by Alex North. Make-up: Norman Pringle. Hair styles: Sherry Wilson, Fae Smith. Costumes co-ordinator: Frank Beetson Sr. Costumes designed by Ann B. Peck. Special effects: Ralph Webb. Assistant directors: Wingate Smith, Russ Saunders. Sound editor: Francis E. Stahl. Sound recording: Jack Solomon. Producer: Bernard Smith.
Copyright 2 January 1965 by Ford-Smith Productions. Released through Warner Bros. New York opening at the Capitol: 23 December 1964. U.S. release: 3 October 1964. U.K. release: 28 December 1964. Australian release: 11 November 1966 (sic). Running times: 161 minutes (London), 158 minutes (New York), 155 minutes (Sydney).
SYNOPSIS: In the 1870s, the Cheyenne Indians are moved from their Wyoming homelands to a barren reservation in Oklahoma. The Indians wait patiently for provisions from the U.S. government. The food never arrives. A year later, the original group of 1,000 has been decimated by disease and starvation to a mere 286. Desperate, the survivors decide to make the 1,500 mile trek back to their Yellowstone hunting grounds. The U.S. government orders a cavalry troop to pursue the Indians and force them back to slow but certain death in the Oklahoma reservation.
NOTES: Clothier’s color cinematography earned him an Academy Award nomination, but he was beaten by Harry Stradling of My Fair Lady.
Location scenes filmed in Utah and Colorado, including Monument Valley.
If we except Young Cassidy on which he worked for only a few days, this was John Ford’s second last film.
VIEWERS’ GUIDE: Adults.
COMMENT: No doubt about it, critics agree the first half of this film is superior to the latter portion. True, the second half has a scintillating performance by Karl Malden, and some wonderful compositions; but it ends up very tamely back at the studio, with Edward G. Robinson preaching peace against some vile back projection. The first half, however, is vintage Ford: horsemen silhouetted against the skyline or driving through the arid, dusty plain of Monument Valley, the preacher entering the deserted school-house — the sun-slatted light filtering through the dust; and the wonderful Dodge City interlude with Stewart and Elizabeth Allen.
OTHER VIEWS: At the end of 1963 Stewart worked for the last time with John Ford on the comic interlude to Cheyenne Autumn, the director’s well-intentioned but leaden drama about the long flight of the Cheyenne tribe back to their ancestral lands in the Dakotas. Lasting about a quarter of an hour, the sequence was a tired rehash of earlier Fordian material, especially from Two Rode Together, delighting in cowardice, corruption and drunkenness.
Stewart was again a marshal, dressed very much as in the town sequences of Two Rode Together, once more on the take (receiving ten per cent of gambling revenues) and indifferent to his duties, but this time he was presented as being Wyatt Earp in Dodge City. Playing poker in the saloon, Stewart mugs it up from the start, pretending he can’t see the cards and mumbling “Is that an ace? Blind as a bat...” but detecting that the Major (John Carradine) has removed one card from the deck by feeling its weight and flicking it past his ear. Challenged to draw his gun by Ken Curtis’s cowboy, he tries to ignore the threat but shoots the man in the foot with his pocket Derringer when he goes for his gun.
— James Stewart by Allen Eyles.
“In most Westerns,” John Ford remarked at a 1964 press preview, “you never really get to see the Indians. They’re off on a cliff somewhere, they come riding down on the stagecoach, they bite the dust, and that’s it. I wanted to make a picture in which the audience not only met the Indians face to face, but got to know and admire them.” The picture he was talking about was Cheyenne Autumn and in it Ford shows that his long standing love affair with the old West, its ways and its people, has not waned. The only difference is that this time it is the Cavalry, not the Indians, who supply the menace. Cheyenne Autumn recounts with admiration the exploits of a small band of Indians in their determined trek of over 1,500 miles to their former hunting grounds and way of life. Never have Indians appeared more noble on the screen. Through them, Ford seems to celebrate the victory of all victims of injustice who win out through bravery, honesty, and unswerving belief in the rightness of their cause. Diminishing this epic theme, however, is a script that abounds in one-dimensional characters and movie-conventional situations.
— Arthur Knight in The Saturday Review.
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John Hodiak (Cochise), Robert Stack (Major Burke), Joy Page (Consuelo de Cordova), Rico Alaniz (Felipe), Fortunio Bonanova (Mexican minister), Edward Colmans (Don Francisco de Cordova), Alex Montoya (Garcia), Steven Ritch (Tukiwah), Carol Thurston (Terua), Rodd Redwing (Red Knife), Robert E. Griffin (Sam Maddock), Poppy del Vando (Senora de Cordova), John Crawford (Bill Lawson), Joseph Waring (Running Cougar), Guy Edward Hearn (General Gadsden), Charles Stevens (Apache negotiator).
Director: WILLIAM CASTLE. Screenplay: Arthur Lewis, DeVallon Scott. Story: DeVallon Scott. Photographed in Technicolor by Henry Freulich. Film editor: Al Clark. Art director: Paul Palmentola. Set decorator: Sidney Clifford. Technicolor color consultant: Francis Cugat. Music director: Mischa Bakaleinikoff. Assistant director: Sam Nelson. Sound recording: Josh Westmoreland. Western Electric Sound System. Associate producer: Herbert Leonard. Producer: Sam Katzman.
Copyright 3 September 1953 by Columbia Pictures Corp. No New York opening. U.S. release: September 1953. U.K. release on the lower half of a double bill: 5 February 1954. Australian release: 31 December 1954. 8 reels. 6,317 feet. 70 minutes.
SYNOPSIS: Shortly after the Mexican-American war, a cavalry major is sent to make peace with the Apaches.
VIEWER’S GUIDE: Not suitable for young children.
COMMENT: Starts promisingly with lots of real Indian extras raiding a hacienda, the fear of the peons reflected in an unusually imaginative series of rapid close-ups, but soon stumbles into one of these noble savage falls for sophisticated white woman yarns. Naturally, the course of true love does not run smooth. There are a few plot twists and double-crosses and a bit more action before the final leave-taking finale. Through it all, Robert Stack sails imperturbably, whilst John Hodiak plays Cochise with reasonable dignity and Joy Page makes a reasonably convincing Consuelo. Aside from a few unexpected touches here and there, direction and credits are pretty routine — with the accent on “pretty” thanks to the asset of Technicolor photography. Production values are okay, but it all adds up to very moderate entertainment for very unsophisticated yet very undemanding audiences. Robert Stack doesn’t so much as even mention this one in his autobiography. By Katzman “B” levels of excitement, it’s not all that low, but I’m sure this Hodiak Cochise is a starring vehicle Mr Stack would prefer to forget. (Jeff Chandler played Cochise in both Broken Arrow and The Battle at Apache Pass and is often identified with this role).
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Robert Livingston (Stony Brooke), Raymond Hatton (Rusty Joslin), Duncan Renaldo (Rico), Kay Griffith (Maria), George Douglas (Ransome), Ruth Robinson (Mama Rinaldo), Paul Marion (Carlos Rinaldo), John Merton (Gregg), Tom Chatterton (Major Norton), Guy D’Ennery (Diego), Tom London (Martin), Reed Howes (Stevens), and Dick Alexander, Art Mix, Jack Montgomery, Edward Hearn, Frank McCarroll, Jack Kirk, Al Taylor, Lee Shumway, Barry Hays, Elias Gomboa, Herman Hack, Ken Terrell, Tex Palmer.
Director: GEORGE SHERMAN. Screenplay: Earle Snell. Based on characters created by William Colt MacDonald. Photography: William Nobles. Film editor: Bernard Loftus. Music score: Cy Feuer. Production manager: Al Wilson. Associate producer: Harry Grey. Executive producer: Herbert J. Yates.
Copyright 22 April 1940 by Republic Pictures Corp. No New York showcase. U.S. release: 22 April 1940. No Australian release. 56 minutes.
SYNOPSIS: 1878: Ruthless opportunists are smuggling Mexican silver across the border into Arizona.
NOTES: Number 30 of Republic’s money-spinning 52-picture “The Three Mesquiteers” series.
VIEWERS’ GUIDE: Okay for all.
COMMENT: So chock-a-block full of feisty action that I didn’t have time to worry about any momentary slowings of pace due to camera hogging by Raymond Hatton and Ruth Robinson. Miss Griffith is a bit of a phoney too. But these three roles are so comparatively small, they don’t really matter. What does count is all the thrilling stuntwork, fights, special effects, running inserts, chases, shoot-outs, ambushes and dynamiting in which Livingston (and/or his daring double) plays a major part.
If it’s suspensefully constructed action you want, Covered Wagon Days (the title has absolutely nothing whatever to do with the plot) is one of the most exciting of the “trio hero” westerns.
Sherman has directed this one (he made no less than nine westerns in 1940) with considerable flair, aided by Nobles’ winningly moody exterior and studio cinematography.
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Gene Autry (himself), Gail Davis (Ginger Kirby), Clark “Buddy” Burroughs (Duke Kirby), Harry Shannon (Sandy), Jock Mahoney (Tod Jeffreys), Sandy Sanders (Stormy), Ralph Sanford (Dalrymple), Steve Darrell (Hilliard), Harry Harvey (sheriff), Bud Osborne (Copeland), Holly Bane (Phillips), Robert Hilton (Miller), Ted Mapes (Ed), House Peters, Jr (Gill Saunders), Felice Raymond (sheriff’s wife), Boyd Stockman (Boyd), Chuck Roberson (Mike), Blackie Whiteford, Tom Smith, Jack Tornek, Victor Cox, Pat O’Malley, Roy Bucko, Heinie Conklin, Hank Mann (townsmen), Ken Cooper, Walt La Rue (cowhands), Frankie Marvin (Frankie), Frank McCarroll, Frank O’Connor, Herman Hack (ranch owners), and “Champion”.
Director: JOHN ENGLISH. Screenplay: Gerald Geraghty. Film editor: Henry Batista. Photography: William Bradford. Art director: Harold MacArthur. Set decorator: Sidney Clifford. Hair styles: Helen Hunt. Make-up: Newt Jones. Stunts: Walt La Rue, Chuck Roberson. Stunt doubles: Sandy Sanders (for Gene Autry), Jock Mahoney (for Steve Darrell). Music supervisor: Paul Mertz. Music director: Mischa Bakaleinikoff. Songs (all rendered by Autry): “Powder Your Face With Sunshine”, “Buffalo Gal”, “Down in the Valley”, “The Cowboy’s Lament”. Camera operator: Frank G. Carson. Stills: Homer Van Pelt. Grip: Don Murphy. Continuity girl: Violet Newfield. Assistant director: Paul Donnelly. Sound recording: Lambert E. Day (supervisor), Tom Lambert (engineer). Producer: Armand Schaefer. Executive producer: Gene Autry.
Copyright 22 March 1950 by Gene Autry Productions. Released through Columbia: 19 May 1950 (USA), floating from May 1951 (England), 29 June 1950 (Australia). 6,403 feet. 71 minutes.
U.K. release title: BARBED WIRE. [Autry used this title himself in 1952. See posters].
VIEWER’S GUIDE: Most strictly adults.
COMMENT: This tidy little western has much to commend it, including a neat script, agreeable acting, crisp location photography and fairly lively direction. Gail Davis makes for a spirited little heroine, and we enjoyed Jock Mahoney’s vigorous, hard-hitting performance as one of the villains. Harry Shannon’s surly livery stableman was a stand-out too.
On the debit side, however, are all the usual black marks of the Saturday matinee entry: Although, as a potted opening narrative of the history of barbed wire makes clear, the story is set in the 1880s, not the slightest attempt is made to put the picture in period. The heroine even wears a pair of tight-fitting jeans (not that we’re complaining). What’s worse, Autry’s singing interludes (felicitous though they are in themselves) not only bring the action to a screaming halt at times, but seem more out of tune with the story than ever. Autry himself comes across not only as a character weirdly out of place in this ensemble, but as a rather stoic and even unmanly hero. He makes no play for the heroine at all, even though presented with several grand opportunities. Instead he seems far more interested in someone else. (It’s amazing how community attitiudes change. What would have passed unnoticed in 1950, now appears highly suspect. The idea that anything untoward could have been inferred from the incidents presented here would never have occurred to anyone connected with the movie in 1950. Those incidents were undoubtedly embedded in the story purely as a sop to the Saturday matinee crowd. Today’s more sophisticated youngsters, however, are likely to interpret the motives behind the dialogue quite differently. Furthermore, the plot has several gaping holes which 2011 kids will probably notice. Not even English’s well-paced direction can hide the fact that at least one of the lead characters is a bonehead).
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George Montgomery (Bret Ivers), Karin Booth (Julie Hanson), Jerome Courtland (Larry Galland), William Bishop (Silver Kirby), Richard Egan (Strap Galland), Don Porter (Denver Jones), John Dehner (Emil Cabeau), Roy Roberts (Marshall Tetheroe), George Cleveland (“Hardrock” Hanson), Byron Foulger (Hawkins), Robert Bice (James Sullivan), Grandon Rhodes (Drummond), Zon Murray (Lefty), Peter Brocco (cashier), Cliff Clark (Winfield Hatton), Robert G. Anderson (Muldoon), Harry Cording (Hibbs), Cris Alcaide (Jeff).
Director: RAY NAZARRO. Original screenplay: Richard Schayer. Photographed in Technicolor by William V. Skall. Technicolor color consultant: Francis Cugat. Film editor: Richard Fantl. Art director: Charles Clague. Set decorator: Fred MacLean. Music director: Mischa Bakaleinikoff. Assistant director: Carl Hiecke. Sound recording: Frank Goodwin. Western Electric Sound System. Producer: Edward Small. A Resolute Picture.
Copyright 17 June 1952 by Columbia Pictures Corp. No New York opening. U.S. release: 1 July 1952. U.K. release on the lower half of a double bill: May 1953. Australian release: 16 January 1953. 79 minutes. Censored to 76 minutes in the U.K.
SYNOPSIS: The gold mines of Cripple Creek are being robbed blind, so government agents are sent to the town to uncover the thieves.
VIEWERS’ GUIDE: Despite reservations by the British censor, I thought it okay for all.
COMMENT: A routine story with a few original twists, nicely mounted in color and surprisingly well directed by Ray Nazarro who keeps interest high throughout and handles a wild free-for-all at the climax most effectively and convincingly. I couldn’t spot any stunt doubles either. Montgomery and company seemed to be doing all their own punching.
OTHER VIEWS: Sorry to disillusion you, but doubles are used in the finale fight. Very cleverly though. And a lot of the work is certainly done by the principals themselves. I agree the movie has an unusual amount of surface polish for a Nazarro oater. But good locations are sometimes offset by obvious studio backdrops. All told, I would describe the direction as competent rather than stylish, its aim undermined by Katzman serial standard music and hasty-tasty cinematography — Montgomery lights a small lamp which floods the room with light — which fails to flatter Miss Booth. She looks too old for the part, but fortunately her screen time is comparatively short. The other players are more interesting. Monty plays the secretly Secret Service agent with ease, surrounded by a very capable support roster including old friends like Byron Foulger as a cut-rate undertaker, suave villain William Bishop (who has a great Russian roulette scene with Egan who is surprisingly believable here) and his henchmen John Dehner and Don Porter. Even that perennial old bore George Cleveland is breezily entertaining.
— John Howard Reid writing as George Addison.
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Charles Starrett (Steve Reynolds/The Durango Kid), Smiley Burnette (himself), Fred F. Sears (Captain Barham), Clayton Moore (Grat Hanlon), Colbert Clark (cook), Edmund Cobb (henchman), Bob Wilke (Bunco), Louis Lettieri (Johnny), George Chesebro (Bret Fuller), Frank O’Connor (Doc), Merle Travis and his Bronco Busters.
Narrated by Charles Starrett.
Director: RAY NAZARRO. Original screenplay: Barry Shipman and Edward Earl Repp. Photography: Henry Freulich. Film editor: Paul Borofsky. Art director: Charles Clague. Set decorator: George Montgomery. Music supervisor: Paul Mertz. Music director: Mischa Bakaleinikoff. Producer: Colbert Clark.
Copyright 15 August 1951 by Columbia Pictures Corp. No New York opening. U.S. release: 14 August 1951. U.K. release: May 1954. Not theatrically released in Australia. 4,779 feet. 53 minutes.
SYNOPSIS: A government agent suspects that a horse rancher has murdered a competitor so that he’ll secure the contract to supply the U.S. cavalry. The agent befriends a young Indian boy who is the dead rancher’s heir.
NOTES: Number 124 of Starrett’s 132 starring westerns.
VIEWERS’ GUIDE: Okay for all.
COMMENT: The story for this Durango Kid B-grader is built around some impressive stock footage of wild horses being rounded up. Fortunately, the photographic quality of most of the stock material matches that of the film itself so that it integrates well, but they might at least have thrown up a bit of dust in front of the cut-ins. Still, there are a couple of good chases with running inserts, two good fights (the first climaxed by Jock Mahoney doubling for the Durango Kid in a leap into the saddle), though the scenery is unattractive and it is impossible to get very excited about the story.