VividSimon Simply Perfect

Micitype Pretty Good

Moustroll Good movie but grossly overrated

Logan By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

Bill Slocum A passable first effort by John Wayne for Lone Star Westerns is undone by odd comic relief and an attempt at strangling the career of Hollywood's greatest cowboy before it began by giving him a guitar.That's right, it's time for the musical stylings in the key of Duke. Ellington, he's not."His eyes were blazing with flames of hate/ And his guns were loaded with poison bait/ As they hung and swung at his side."That's Wayne as "Singin Saunders," known around the Old West as "the most notorious gunman since Billy the Kid," apparently for his ability to mow down hombres acapella. As an offstage singer tunelessly mutters lyrics while caressing a guitar with an oven mitt, Wayne lip-synchs his way into battle.It's the first of three Lone Star singing-cowboy roles for Wayne, and the one that jumps out at you for the way it is doggedly incorporated into the plot, with five separate scenes where Wayne's character breaks into song.When Wayne isn't singing, his quiet strength and easy charm make him a good fit for a low-key oater about a rough boss named Kincaid (Forrest Taylor) using his water rights to starve out a law-abiding town. Cecilia Parker makes for a lovely love interest, and Wayne is partnered for the first time ever by George (not yet Gabby) Hayes as Parker's pa. They make a fine trio.Unfortunately, this film has other issues. Everyone in it operates as if no one has a memory lasting more than five minutes. For example, after Parker's character is saved by Saunders, she comes to believe he is working for Kincaid and confronts him. Saunders shoots Kincaid's chief muscle and then gets offered the vacated job because Kincaid doesn't hold grudges.One sequence involves Saunders' plan to bypass Kincaid's water- rights chokehold by having a stooge ride a water wagon to the town, wait for Kincaid's goons to ride up and shoot said stooge in mid-drive, then ride up behind the goons and board the runaway wagon before it goes off a cliff. It's a good plan because {BRIEF SPOILER} Saunders works for the government and clinging onto the bottom of a runaway wagon restricts his ability to burst into song.The film suffers from a strange decision to save on comic relief by having clowns Al St. John and Heinie Conklin double as Kincaid's main henchmen. They stumble around in pursuit of Sandy in a serious of contrived encounters, one of which winds up with them lassoed together. "You make a fine pair of lovebirds," Kincaid sneers.But the real black mark on this lemon is the singing. Wayne didn't like having to do it, and it shows in a performance suggesting director Robert N. Bradbury had Wayne's family and dog tied up somewhere. It's an uncomfortable start to Wayne's Lone Star era, which did produce some decent results once Wayne left his guitar with Gene and Roy.

ma-cortes Early talkie in which John Wayne accompanied by George ¨Gaby¨ Hayes and a beautiful damsel face ominous enemies who attempt to take the water supply . Bad guy Kincaid (Forrest Taylor) controls the local water supply and plans to do in the other ranchers . Government agent Saunders (John Wayne) shows up undercover to do in Kincaid and to find out who is stealing water from the local farmers . Meantime, Saunders wins the heart of one of his victims , Fay Denton (Cecilia Parker) . Sanders meets Charlie Denton (George Gaby Hayes, this time without beard and he bears the comic relief , as usual), an old rancher , become partners and Sandy helps as well as secures water rights for farmers . Meanwhile , the nasty wealthy Land Baron seeks vengeance and take lands from poor farmers at exorbitant rates. The picture gets thrills , Western action , shootouts , a love story , and several fights between Wayne and his enemies ; being quite entertaining and including some comical elements . It's a low budget film with good actors , technicians, mediocre production values , pleasing results and usually regarded as one of the best Westerns made by John Wayne during his ¨Lone Star¨ period . The picture packs brawls and fights in silent cinema style and and exciting pursuits . Nice acting by John Wayne as a young Singin' Sandy Saunders who finds himself involved with claim jumpers , powerful owners and ambitious guys . Very early Wayne has the Duke looking awfully young as an undercover agent securing water rights and he even sings some songs . Sympathetic performance from veteran George ¨Gaby¨ Hayes as short-tempered person , Gaby steals the show , as usual . One of the few sidekicks to land on the annual list of Top Ten Western Box office Stars, he did so repeatedly . In his early films, he alternated between whiskered comic-relief sidekicks and clean-shaven bad guys, but by the later 1930s, he worked almost exclusively as a Western sidekick to stars such as John Wayne, Roy Rogers, and Randolph Scott. After his last film, in 1950, he starred as the host of a network television show devoted to stories of the Old West for children, The Gabby Hayes Show (1950). Mediocre cinematography by Archie Stout , a notorious cameraman with a long career . Being necessary an alright remastering because of the film-copy is washed-out . The failure of the original copyright holder to renew the film's copyright resulted in it falling into public domain, meaning that virtually anyone could duplicate and sell a VHS/DVD copy of the film . Therefore, many of the versions of this film available on the market are either severely and usually badly edited and/or of extremely poor quality, having been duplicated from second- or third-generation or more copies of the film . The motion picture was professionally directed by Robert North Bradbury who made various early John Wayne vehicles .John Wayne played a great role in the super-production ¨The big trail¨(1930) but he subsequently fell in B series during the thirties . Most of them in ¨Lone Star¨ productions , usually directed by Robert N. Bradbury , such as : ¨Rough romance¨, ¨The range feud¨, ¨Texas cyclone¨, ¨Two-fisted law¨, ¨Ride him cowboy¨, ¨Big stampede¨, ¨Haunted gold¨ , ¨The telegraph law¨, ¨Somewhere in Sonora¨ , ¨The man from Utah¨ , The man from Monterrey¨, ¨The lawless frontier¨ , ¨West of the divide¨, Rainbow Valley¨ , The desert trail¨ , The dawn rider¨, ¨Lawless range¨, The Oregon Trail¨ , and ¨Born in the west¨ . In 1938 he participated in Republic series with ¨The three musketeers¨ replacing Robert Livingston and in which George Sherman directed 8 films . Later on , Wayne starred the hit ¨The stagecoach¨ by John Ford and took part in ¨A movies¨ such as¨: ¨Allegheny uprising¨, ¨Dark command¨, ¨The spoilers¨, ¨In old California¨, ¨War of the wildcats¨, ¨Tall in the saddle¨, ¨Flame of the Barbary Coast¨ and ¨Dakota¨ . And financed his first production : ¨Angel and the badman¨ . Subsequently , with ¨Red River¨ John rose at top box-office and after that , he starred many successes .

mge-6 If you are a fan of early Duke movies, this Lone Star oldie is a good one. What more could you ask for than Duke, Yak, and Gabby. Lots of good ridin' and shootin'!!! I found it amazing that Duke's singing voice was Bill Bradbury, who is none other than Bob Steele's twin brother. It has been reported that Bob Steele was a high school classmate and friend of Duke, so twin brother Bill may have been too. Anyway, if you like good, clean, early western movies don't miss this one. We don't have to wonder about hidden meanings or try to figure out underlying themes. Just sit back, relax and enjoy a western movie from a simpler day and time. It's called entertainment folks!!!

alan-morton At the risk of sounding like a complete anorak, I have to confess to a deep affection for John Wayne's Lone Star westerns. Every one has a mighty fine title, usually nothing much to do with the story being told. They have that addictive quality that other people find in today's soap operas. In both types, the plots are familiar and preposterous, the characters are off-the-peg, the acting is poor, the heroines are pretty, and the leading man looks good (especially on a horse in J.W.'s case).Of all J.W.'s Lone Star films, this one is my favourite. It has all the virtues listed above, maybe not as developed as in some of the later films, but there nevertheless. I particularly enjoy the way a character is introduced in the first reel, made to disappear for most of the film, and reintroduced at the end. The heroine is delightful in jodhpurs, and the bad guy simply looks dastardly in them. Then there are the pistols that seemingly are deadly at several hundred yards. And an important prop is what I take to be a genuine stagecoach.But this film has notable extras: "interesting" singing, some truly exciting stunt work, and a remarkably lyrical climax that I don't think Robert N Banbury ever came close to emulating again. It's so good that you'd almost believe that Ingmar Bergman had seen this film and been inspired by it as he started on Virgin Spring.Note to students of film: it's probably a bad idea to try that suggestion on your teacher!