Films Around the World

Blue Steel, is not so demanding of Wayne but it shows the same appealing sense of youthful sincerity that marked the less intense moments of West of the Divide--the likable, gauche manner, awkward but genuine, the sideways smile or open-mouthed grin, the sense of a largely unexplored but real strength of personality. Wayne played the U.S. marshal who sees a robbery and is suspected of being the thief by the sheriff (a tobacco-chewing George Hayes, working towards his later comedy image). The...

Singing western starring Eddie Dean. "With plenty of gunplay, a fair plot and okay songs spotted in the right places, 'Range Beyond the Blue' emerges as a better-than-average oatuner in the Eddie Dean series. Cayuse classic should find acceptance in most action situations. Still operating as undercover investigators, Eddie Dean and pardner, Roscoe Ates, foil a stagecoach holdup on a line owned and operated by Helen Mowery. Stage's gold shipments ostensibly are the loot sought by the road...

With PRC [Producer's Releasing Corp.] making every effort to produce westerns for Eddie Dean that are comparable to those Republic turns out for Roy Rogers, it won't be long before their personable singing cowboy star becomes Roy's closest competition with western fans. Like Rogers he is the type the kids go for. And his new picture, 'Romance of the West,' is a good, fast, rough outdoor film, photographed in Cinecolor. The story of this new picture... is not original, but it's been quite a...

Singing cowboy movie starring Tex Ritter and Dave O'Brien. "Tex, Dave and Panhandle hear about a new racket in Alkali Springs. Whenever a fugitive from justice is jailed, an outlaw gang frees him, then cold-bloodedly kills him and collects the reward money. When the police captain discovers a striking resemblance between Dave and Steve Carson, a 'wanted man,' they cook up a plot. A $10,000 reward is put on Carson's head, and Dave poses as Carson. Panhandle poses as 'Doc' Perkins, with Porky...

...The Lawless Frontier, cast Wayne as John Tobin with Robert Bradbury directing his own script. Here Wayne was out to avenge the death of his parents at the hands of a Mexican outlaw called Zanti (Earl Dwire, somewhat miscast). Wayne teams up with Dusty, an oldtimer played by George Hayes (a sympathetic part again) who has also suffered from Zanti's actions and, together with Dusty's daughter (Sheila Terry), they bring the bandit's career to an end. (John Wayne, Allen Eyles, 1979, p. 42)

Steve Kinney and his henchman, Mort, are trying to stir up trouble between the local ranchers and farmers, behind a wave of rustling and lawlessness. Mort kills Vic, a Kirby cowhand, and lays the blame on Dan Harper, the leader of the farmers faction. Storekeeper Fuzzy Q. Jones, fearful of losing the outstanding charge-accounts he has on his books, drags his reluctant pal, Billy Carson, into the fray, and the two soon prove Kinney and his henchmen to be behind the valley's troubles.

The Man From Utah opened vigorously with Wayne's John Weston stepping into a fight on the side of the law in a small town but refusing the job of deputy sheriff as he is on his way to deal with a gang who are exploiting a rodeo. There he enters a horse-riding contest and, urged by the outlaws to lose the race to mutual benefit, he sets out to win after removing a needle coated with deadly snake poison and planted in his saddle. The rodeo background introduced some variety into the series but...

Average western featuring Bob Steele as adopted Indian who tracks down his foster father's killer. Plot involves a jumping frog, a locket with a picture of his real mother who was killed by Apaches, his reunion with his real father, who recognizes locket, romance, and so on. "... two parts murder and revenge, spiced lightly with humor and stirred by the long arm of coincidence. But since the shooting, riding, fisticuffs, and jailbreaks follow through without scenic or romantic breathers, the...

Billy Carson, a rambling cowpoke, prevents the hold-up of the Red River Express stage and saves Linda Bowen, daughter of the owner, from being kidnaped. The hold-up is part of the plan of Steve Kirby, gambler and gang leader, to force Jed Bowen to sell the line to him. When henchmen report their failure, Kirby brings about the release from jail of Matt Brawley, tough killer, intending to use him as a gun fighter and also hoping to beat Brawley out of the loot of several bank hold- ups. But the...

When the request of Bill Butler..., in charge of stringing telegraph wires across the plains for cavalry to protect his men from outlaws is refused, the job of protecting the line goes to three wandering cowhands, Eddie (Eddie Dean), Stormy (Al La Rue) and Soapy (Roscoe Ates). Drake Dawson... regarded as the leading citizen of a nearby town but really a crook does everything in his power to prevent the stringing of wires. He foments an Indian uprising. He has his men beat up Soapy and Butler....

'Neath Arizona Skies presented Wayne as Chris Morrell, the guardian of a half-caste girl, Nina (Shirley Ricketts). She is the heir to some land rich in oil. Wayne is helping her to locate her missing father and when bandits attack them Nina escapes and Wayne is left for dead, his clothes exchanged for those of a notorious bank robber. When heroine Clara Moore (Sheila Terry) discovers him, she believes in his story despite recognizing the clothes as those of a wanted man. Eventually bandits...