Gilbert "Pee Wee" Holmes Movies

In this western, based on a Zane Grey novel, a cowboy is falsely accused of stealing cows. Fortunately, his gal stands by her man as he tries to prove his innocence. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

Filmed in the desert near Lake Elsinore and Lake Hemet, CA, and in the San Jacinto Mountains, The Man From Hell's Edges was the fourth of six Bob Steele Westerns produced by Trem Carr for release by Sono Art-World Wide. Escaping from Hell's Edges, desert penitentiary Flash Manning (Steele) heads for the town of Raleigh where he saves the sheriff (Robert E. Homans) from being ambushed by Lobo (Julian Rivero), a Mexican gunman. The grateful sheriff deputizes Flash, who now uses the name "Bob Williams." Three months later, three of Flash's fellow inmates, the Drake brothers (Dick Dickinson, Buck Carey) and Joe Danti (Perry Murdock), arrive in Raleigh and Flash, whose identity has been revealed by a wanted poster, joins their gang. There is a confrontation with Lobo, who was responsible for the crime that put the Drake brothers and Danti behind bars in the first place, and Flash is revealed to be working for the secret service. The revelation comes as a welcome surprise for the sheriff's daughter (Nancy Drexel), who has fallen in love with him. The Man From Hell's Edges is the kind of lackadaisical B-Western where continuity is less important than action. The wanted poster, for example, mistakenly records Steele's character as "Flash Martin," while he is called Flash Manning throughout the film. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi

In this western, the leader of an outlaw band gets conned on a steamship voyage. To get revenge he holds the con man's fearless sister hostage in the mining town he calls home base. The two fall in love. Another band of desperados attacks the town. A shoot-out ensues and only the gang leader and the girl survive. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

Western hero Ken Maynard lifted his voice in a campfire song, making the near tone-deaf actor the first "singing cowboy." Other than Ken's warbling and sound in general, Mountain Justice told the rather timeworn Western story of a young man searching for his father's killer. Jud McTavish (Otis Harlan) is ambushed and shot on his Oklahoma ranch. The only clue to the killer's identity is a letter of warning and the old man's dying words: "Kettle Creek -- Kentucky!" Young Ken McTavish travels to Kettle Creek posing as deaf in the hope that handwriting will disclose the author of the mysterious letter. It does -- in time -- but an old feud between the McTavishes and the Harlands complicates matters. As it turns out, the letter was written by lovely Coral Harland (Kathryn Crawford, who sings several songs in the film) and the two youngsters fall in love. Universal, who resumed production of series Westerns after acquiring the services of Maynard, gave the star more or less free reign on this film, which was released as a "Ken Maynard Production." Thus, Maynard was responsible for the appearance in this film of black comedian Blue Washington, whose stereotyped mugging remains awfully hard to accept for modern audiences. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi

Real-life aviator Al Wilson starred in a series of popular silent actioners, of which 1929's Sky Skidder was among the last. Hero Al Simpkins (Wilson) invents a revolutionary fuel that will enable pilots to clock 1000 miles on a single pint. The villain, surprisingly enough, is not an oil magnate who hopes to suppress the invention, but instead a run-of-the-mill mustache-twirler (Walter McGaugh) who wants to steal the fuel for himself. Caught in the middle of all this is heroine Stella Hearns (Helen Foster), who ends up being kidnapped by the heavy. In the film's climactic "money scene," hero and villain duke it out on the wing of a plane in flight (a specialty of star Al Wilson). ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Directed by a very young William Wyler, this fanciful Ted Wells Western from the assembly-lines at Universal reads like a Hoot Gibson reject. Wells plays Jack Duncan, a ranch hand planning to give his new, female employer Betty Barton (Charlotte Stevens), a welcoming reception she won't soon forget. Arriving from the East with her aunt (Julia Griffith), the girl is delighted to be greeted with a mock Indian attack arranged by Jack and ranch foreman Lon Seeright (William J. Dyer). Jack plans to give Betty yet another chance to experience the wild and woolly West by staging a "kidnapping" during a masked ball. Unfortunately, crooked gambler Lem Dawson (William A. Steele) gets in the way by abducting the pretty girl for real. Wyler, a distant relative of Universal's benign founder Carl Laemmle, began his long, celebrated directorial career helming B-Westerns starring contract cowboys such as Wells and Fred Humes. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi

A ranch foreman (Fred Humes) is falsely accused of a robbery actually committed by his look-alike cousin (also Humes), a feared villain known as the "Night Hawk." The plot thickens when the criminal Humes pretends to be his law-abiding cousin, but everything is quickly solved -- and without any expensive split-screen wizardry. Humes, a former stunt-man whose acting abilities, or lack thereof, became a decided liability in the sound era, was not the best choice to play a potentially difficult dual-role, and the film was further handicapped by employing too many comic sidekicks (five in all, including Ben Corbett, Pee Wee Holme and the obese Scotty Mattraw). ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi

A crooked rancher (George B. French) and his nasty son (Cuyler Supplee) buy up the area's water rights to drive out the local farmers. Enter Fred Humes, the stalwart cowboy hero of the Francis Ford Ranch, who manages to lure the villains into a trap. The prize for ridding the community of outlaws is the old rancher's peppy daughter (Dorothy Gulliver). Edgar Lewis replaced William Wyler as director of the Humes series. Wyler, of course, went straight to the top, while the pedestrian Lewis, a former house director at Fox (who earlier helmed such "socially relevant" melodramas as 1915's Nigger), retired shortly after the changeover to sound. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi

Right away, the title to this comedy-drama indicates that it's not the usual Tom Mix picture, although it does have its beginnings in the West. While traveling through the prarie, an elderly and cantankerous lady loses control of her car. One of the locals, Tom Faxton (Mix), comes to her rescue. He receives the full impact of the woman's gratitude a few years later when she dies and bequeaths him a rest home for elderly ladies. Faxton heads East with his pal, Bunk McGinnis (Pee Wee Holmes), where he becomes very popular with the home's residents. He also becomes pretty popular with one of the nurses, Edith Oliver (Gertrude Olmstead). One of the ladies, Mrs. Carmichael (Gertrude Claire), is sorely neglected by her artist son, Evan (Philo McCullough). Faxton uses force to make Evan do right by his mother, and then sweeps Edith off her feet, right to the altar. McGinnis, meanwhile finds romance with the housekeeper. ~ Janiss Garza, Rovi

Director Lynn F. Reynolds, Western star Tom Mix, and cameraman Benjamin Kline travelled to San Francisco for this average Mix oater based on a story by William McLeod Raine. Mix played Larry McBride, a cowboy who, according to the film's press-book, "goes to city, dresses up to date and gets into thrilling and humorous adventures." Most of these "thrilling and humorous adventures" centered on Ora Carew, whom Mix saves from both a rattlesnake and a wild steer. Veteran sagebrush comic Gilbert "Pee Wee" Holmes was along for the ride, but his humorous antics were a definite matter of taste. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi