Rogue of the Rio Grande (1930)

Not without some appeal but largely a bit of a run-of-the-mill Western.

El Malo (José Bohr) robs the bank of a small town. However, El Malo is a Robin Hood figure who gives the stolen pesos to the poor of the town. El Malo manages to evade capture but falls for the charms of the cantina singer Carmita (Myrna Loy). El Malo then witnesses the robbery of a stagecoach by real outlaws using his name, their leader turns out to be the mayor (Gene Morgan) of the town...

This is a fairly standard and unsurprising Western though has some music thanks to Carmita (but not that good) and is played light, with bad guys stopped by sitting on cactuses rather than bullets. An early talkie with typical sound issues including awkward dialogue at times. It is probably most interesting for being early in the careers of both Bohr and Loy who went onto much bigger and better things either side of the Rio Grande.

Riders of the Purple Sage (1925)

A classic silent era Western, based on the famous Zane Grey novel.

Jim Carson (Tom Mix) rides to the rescue when his sister (Beatrice Burnham) and her daughter is kidnapped by some bad dudes on the order of the evil Lew Walters (Warner Oland). Jim saves his sister, then he links up with rancher Jane (Mabel Ballin) in her fight against some cattle rustlers called the Riders of the Purple Sage. Behind their crooked antics secretly is Walters, who is posing as a judge...

This has all you need for a top quality Western, a great hero, a great villain, superb scenery and lots and lots of action.

Gunsmoke Ranch (1937)

One of the Three Mesquiteers series of B-movie Western, it isn't anything other than a routine example of the genre.

Following devastating floods which destroy farmland, Flagg (Kenneth Harlan) offers to relocate the farmers on new land which he has bought and will sell to them cheap. However, the Three Mesquiteers: Stony Brooke (Robert Livingston), Tucson Smith (Ray Corrigan) and Lullaby Joslin (Max Terhune) discover that Flagg is a crook. The land the new farmers have bought from Flagg is due to be submerged when a new dam is built...

It is all rather formulaic to be honest. Plenty of gun fights on horseback and other scraps (of dubious standard), a couple of country songs and some humour. Nothing in this film is that original but it is reasonably competent and worthwhile.

Tex Rides with the Boy Scouts (1937)

A reasonable if unexceptional western. A gang has stolen a million dollars worth of gold. Tex (Tex Ritter) and his two partners (Horace Murphy and Snub Pollard) are looking for the gang when they discover a suspicious looking gold mining operation in a small town. The mine is owned by Dorman (Forrest Taylor) and his goons are seen selling gold nuggets in town.

Tex tricks Dorman into making a move and, with the help of some boy scouts (who actually would not be around until the twentieth century but anyway bear with the film), the gang is rounded up and they all head home happily for tea. 

A standard 1930s western with plenty of horse riding, sixgun shooting, fighting and some fine songs sung by Tex too. Norma (Marjorie Reynolds) is the love interest for Tex. 

Cowboy Holiday (1934)

An adequate yet unexceptional Western. Buck (Guinn "Big Boy" Williams) is a cowboy travelling across the range on holiday, after a slightly strange encounter involving a friend cowboy in a dress and some spanking, he arrives at the home of another friend of his, the Sheriff (John Elliot). Buck learns that the Sheriff is under pressure to bring in the Juarez Kid (Julian Riviero) or lose his job.

However, the Juarez Kid is another friend of Buck and he doesn't think the Kid is guilty. He decides to help the Sheriff and find out who is really doing all the stealing.

So pretty familiar stuff, including a budding romance with a rancher's daughter (Janet Chandler) of course. Unfortunately the film is rather flat and lifeless with some questionable execution. A more charismatic lead would have helped a lot to elevate the material, as it is the film is reasonably competent but no more.

West of the Divide (1934)

An unsurprising but perfectly competent Western. Ted (John Wayne) is still wondering what happened to his brother and smarting at how his Dad was probably killed by Gentry (Lloyd Whitlock) and the family ranch taken over. By sheer chance he sees the opportunity to pose as an outlaw and infiltrate Gentry's gang. Gentry meanwhile is after another ranch, menacing Fred Winters (Lafe McKee) and his daughter Faye (Virginia Brown Faire)...

With the help of his sidekick Dusty (George Gabby Hayes), Ted seeks evidence of Gentry's mis-deeds and finally brings him to rights with much hard horse riding and diving through windows.

Although the story is a bit by numbers (though with a few surprises) and artistically is nothing out of the ordinary, this is a decent Western. John Wayne was not quite the finished article but you can see why he was well on the way to becoming a legend.

The Beast of Hollow Mountain (1956)

A Western / Monster movie... however it makes you wait so long for the monster it can't help but be a bit disappointing when it finally arrives. Jimmy (Guy Madison) is a gringo with a cattle ranch somewhere in Mexico. Local lovely Sarita (Patricia Medina) has caught his eye, much to the distaste of Enrique Rios (Eduardo Noriega) who is her fiancé and also wants Jimmy's ranch. Enrique and Jimmy have a hilariously bad fight in the town, which seems to mostly consist of them knocking over every stall in the market.

But some of Jimmy's cows are disappearing, are they falling into the swamp, being stolen by rustlers or some other reason? After what feels like a lifetime we finally discover it is the other reason... a highly dubious looking monster. He snacks on the hapless Pancho (Pascual Garcia Pena) but can Jimmy save the day with some nifty rope action?

Truly this is not a good film. The monster effects are poor even by the standards of the day. The film also makes you wait for it too long. For cheese value the film isn't bad, and it is undeniably fun once the monster action gets started. It is just a shame it takes so long to get there.

Zorro's Black Whip (Serial) (1944)

There is no Zorro in this serial despite the title, but there is the Black Whip who does a similar job. Idaho is a largely lawless territory which wants to change that with statehood. Local hoodlum Dan Hammond (Francis McDonald) doesn't want any pesky things like law and order getting in the way of his activities though and is determined to block any attempts. Newspaper owner Randolph Meredith (Jay Kirby) is one of the major proponents of statehood which makes him a target for Hammond, luckily Randolph is secretly the Black Whip.

Randolph / the Black Whip dies after a fight with Hammond's goons but his sister Barbara (Linda Stirling) dons the Black Whip costume and continues the fight against Hammond with the help of agent Vic Gordon (George J Lewis)... 

What follows are a standard series of fights, speeded up horse riding and revolvers which contain an amazingly large number of bullets plus lots of cliffhangers of course. This is a decent if not exceptional serial but what makes it stand out is the female lead which was highly unusual for it's day.

A Town Called Hell (1971)

A gritty spaghetti western but taken to such extremes as to approach self-parody. A band of Mexican bandits takes over a small town and massacres much of the population, either by gun or noose. Some time later Alvira (Stella Stevens) turns up with a hearse looking for her husband's body and the identity of his killer and will pay a handsome price in gold.

Obviously the leader in the town, Don Carlos (Telly Savalas) is keen on the reward. The name of the killer is apparently someone called Aguila though no one knows where he is. Not the rebel leaders one of whom is now the priest (Robert Shaw) and The Colonel (Martin Landau)...

In truth the film is rather confusing though also very brutal and sadistic. It is a messy film where the flow is continually interrupted by little vignettes, some of which work some don't. Interesting if not wonderful.

The Dude Ranger (1934)

A very familiar B-movie Western story wise but a good example of the type. Ernest (George O'Brien) arrives from out East to take up his inheritance of a cattle ranch. However, when he gets there he finds the ranch has thousands of livestock missing and as he has been mistaken as just another cowhand he decides to play along to try and find who is behind the cow theft. He suspects the boss Sam (Henry Hall) could be behind it, though when he gets the hots for Sam's daughter Anne (Irene Hervey) things get complicated...

Naturally it is really someone else who is behind the crime (LeRoy Mason) and everything gets sorted out just in time for Ernest and Anne to kiss. The story may lack originality but the film is well made with an emphasis on plot rather than badly choreographed gunfights who so often ruin films of this type. The film does maybe lack a bit of action though having said that.

Sid Saylor provides light relief as a singing sidekick to Ernest.

The Phantom Empire (Serial) (1935)

Now as we know, 1930s movie serials are often quite odd but this one must be one of the strangest of all. It is a kind of mixture of cowboy musical and the usual mad science adventure. The singing cowboy Gene Autry discovers his ranch is above part of the lost continent of Mu and a science city ruled by Queen Tika (Dorothy Christie) is right under his feet!

However, Tika has trouble. Lord Argo (Wheeler Oakman) has led a rebellion to overthrow Tika and threaten the world above. Autry rides to the rescue, assisted by a group of young cowpersons in metal helmets led by Frankie Darro and Betsy King Ross. Can Autry save the world and also his radio show? That is a major plot point you see, the bad guys try to stop him from performing his radio show so he won't be able to keep up the payments on his ranch. There is a fortune in radium under there, and Mu's disintegration ray.

So this has the usual cliff hangers, ingenious (and doomed to fail) traps for our heroes, sparkling scientific apparatus and recycled costumes. Yes as usual the denizens of these lost cities full of advanced science (including sparkling electricity, clunky robots and television) fight with swords and helmets... The addition of cowboys and trick riding makes this serial quite frankly amazing and completely bonkers.

Bar-Z Bad Men (1937)

A decent if not unexceptional B Western with some twists. Jim (Johnny Mack Brown) arrives at a ranch he is a new partner in. However before very long his partner Ed (Jack Rockwell) is shot in an ambush and his ranch's herd is larger than it should be. A neighbouring ranch owner, Hamp (Frank La Rue) has accused Ed of rustling.

Jim thus has to find out what is really going on. Hamp's foreman Brent (Dick Curtis) is behind the reverse rustling to further the nefarious schemes of townsman Sig Bostell (Tom London) to get hold of Ed's land...

So fairly a standard Western ranch war tale, despite the reverse rustling twist the story line is pretty straight forward. Jim defeats the baddies with some decent fighting (though as usual with these Westerns everyone seems to need about 20 shots to make one hit!) and horsemanship. Hemp's daughter Lois (Lois January) plays the love interest for Jim, will he get the girl in the end? There are no surprises there either!

West of Hot Dog (1924)

On his way to the small town of Hot Dog Stan Laurel is held up by rascally outlaws. Stan is on his way to to the town to hear the reading of his Uncle's will, as are the outlaws we later discover. Stan is left everything including the saloon... but if he dies then Bad Mike (Lee Meehan) will get the saloon. Stan obviously decides to flee town but falls right into Bad Mike's lap...

A nice little comedy western, Stan plays his usual goofy character and there are plenty of visual gags and slapstick. The film is a little light but has plenty of charm, one of Stan Laurel's better solo comedies.

The Silver Trail (1937)

A rather run of the mill B-western. Bob (Rex Lease) has arrived in town looking for his friend who has written to him about his silver mine. However when Bob gets to town no one seems to have heard of his friend or the mine. The town dudes have stolen the claim of course, and had Bob's friend killed. Bob takes a while though to cotton on that something is amiss even though the bad guys ability to hide their guilt is seemingly zero...

With the help of clever dog Rin Tin Tin Jr and female outlaw Molly (Mary Russell) Bob finds out what has happened to the claim and brings the bad guys to their well deserved comeuppance. Oh and of course gets the girl too...

Although at times slightly stilted and awkward, and with a fairly average plot, this is a decent enough if not spectacular western. The usual stunts, fights and shoot outs. A few songs too. And the good hats win.

The Law of 45's (1935)

A fairly standard B-movie western that doesn't really get out of second gear (or as it is a western we should say a slow trot). Sir Henry Sheffield (Broderick O'Farrell) turns up from England to survey the area and buy up some land. Crooked lawyer Rontell (Ted Adams) kidnaps Sir Henry and then uses his money to buy up the land of ranchers driven off the land by a mysterious band of hoodlums.

Naturally a couple of good guys passing through get drawn into the fray, even more naturally that a pretty girl is involved in the form of Joan (Molly O'Day). Those guys are Tucson (Guinn Williams) and Al (Stoney Martin) and they save the day...

So the story is standard and the acting is nothing special. Although a short film its padded out a bit with plenty of horse riding. Guinn "Big Boy" Williams puts on a pretty decent turn but there isn't a lot else to elevate this film much above mediocre.

Zorro's Fighting Legion (Serial) (1939)

Don Del Oro, the god of gold, seeks to become the Emperor of Mexico by stopping the gold shipments of the fledgling republic. Don Diego Vega (Reed Hadley) seeks to prevent this in his masked guise of Zorro. What follows are many cliff hangers and escapades until Don Del Oro is finally unmasked...

Along the way Zorro has to combat intrigues as well as many dangerous traps. The true identity of Don Del Oro is finally unveiled in the final episode (of course).

This is a good serial though the cliff hangers are perhaps a bit over the top. They include one where Zorro looks to be crushed by a moving wall! It is good rollicking adventure fun, packed full of great stunts, as a Zorro serial should be.

The Oklahoma Cyclone (1930)

An early talkie Western and not that good to be honest but not without some charm. The story is fairly straightforward: cowboy Jim Smith (Bob Steele) is looking for his father who appears to be held captive by a gang led by the Black Diablo (Charles King)...

Jim disguises himself as an outlaw, the Oklahoma Cyclone, to infiltrate the gang and finally finds his father and has a showdown with the Diablo. Jim does a bit of singing too and romances Rita Rey...

The film is rather slow unfortunately and the actors are, as so often with early talkies a bit awkward and stiff when it comes to dialogue, but the numerous musical interludes lighten the mood.

Sheriff of Tombstone (1941)

Brett (Roy Rogers) and Gabby (Gabby Hayes) turn up in Tombstone. Brett is mistaken for Shotgun Cassidy (Harry Woods) whom the mayor (Addison Richards) has recruited as sheriff in the town.

Brett decides to play along and pretend to be Shotgun. He soon finds out that the mayor has dark plans to take over the town using Shotgun as an enforcer. Meanwhile Brett is also looking for the men who have killed his brother...

A good example of a B-movie western. It is all good clean and straight forward fun with plenty of songs too. Rogers and Hayes make for a good double act.

Texas Terror (1935)

John Wayne stars as Sheriff John Higgins who returns his badge after he (thinks) he has killed his best friend after a robbery.

John ends up helping his best friends' daughter Bess (Lucile Browne) run the ranch she has inherited. He fears though that she will find out who he really is and what he did to her father (although in reality he was innocent of that of course not that he knows)...

A decent little Western though in a more modern setting with motorcars and telephones. The film is fairly run of the mill, though when there is action it is well done. Its interesting to see a young and raw John Wayne.