Roy Rogers Movies

In an effort to compete with Republic's popular songfest Westerns, fours music numbers -- including Tumbling Tumbleweeds -- were added to The Old Wyoming Trail, an otherwise average Charles Starrett vehicle. No singer, Starrett left the vocalizing to his sidekick Donald Grayson and the popular Sons of the Pioneers. En route to purchase a herd of cattle, Bob Patterson (Starrett) and his sidekick Sandy (Grayson) get in the way of a scheme to defraud the local ranchers of their possessions. Aware of the coming railroad, the villains, Lafe Kinney (Guy Usher and Slade (Dick Curtis plot to take over Jeff Halliday's (Edward J. Le Saint) ranch. When Bob and Sandy get suspicious, the villains kidnap Halliday's daughter Elsie (Barbara Weeks). A posse is formed and in desperation, Slade demands that Bob meet him unarmed if Elsie is to be saved. In the ensuing shoot-out, Slade is killed and Bob is free to continue his romance with Elsie. Like many of the Starrett Westerns, The Old Wyoming Trail was filmed at the Andy Jauregui Ranch at Placerita Canyon, California, Jauregui himself appearing as a member of the posse. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Roy and Dale appear as hosts in this family variety show. ~ All Movie Guide

The Yellow Rose of Texas is, at least in the case of this Roy Rogers vehicle, both the title of a song and the name of a fancy showboat. Rogers plays a frontier insurance investigator who is assigned to locate a company payroll stolen several years earlier. Working undercover, Roy poses as a singer on the aforementioned "Yellow Rose of Texas." The showboat's owner, Betty Weston (Dale Evans), is the daughter of the man who was arrested for the robbery. She's convinced that her dad is innocent, and Roy proves that she's right by capturing the genuine culprit. Running seven reels as opposed to the usual six, The Yellow Rose of Texas was marketed as a "special" by canny Republic Pictures. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

According to Roy Rogers himself, this action-packed western remained one of his favorites. The manager of a traveling show, Rogers is wintering at a ranch belonging to wheelchair-bound Colonel Harkrider (George Cleveland), his daughter Kay (Dale Evans) and grandson Larry (Peter Miles). The latter, whose mother, a circus bareback rider, was killed during a performance, grows up with a paralyzing fear of horses. In contrast, Roy wants to purchase a wild stallion accused of being a killer but his bid is turned down and the stallion instead condemned to death. Unbeknownst to Roy, however, Monty Manson (Grant Withers), who heads a crooked "Range Patrol," saves the beast and uses it to terrorize the area's horse-breeders. Putting two and two together, Roy attempts to unmask Manson for the criminal he is but is ambushed by the patrol. The stallion, meanwhile, attacks both Colonel Harkrider and Roy's horse Trigger, Jr. but is chased off the property by Trigger himself. Overcoming his fears, Larry mounts Trigger, Jr. and joins the party searching for Roy. With Trigger's aid, Roy destroys the killer stallion in a final battle and Manson is brought to justice. Backed by Foy Willing, The Riders of the Purple Sage and Dale Evans, Roy Rogers takes time out to perform "May the Good Lord Take a Likin' to Ya", by Peter Tinturin; "The Big Rodeo", by Foy Willing; and "Stampede", by Willing and Carol Rice. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Opening with a brief look at Republic Pictures' back lot in Studio City, CA, this average Roy Rogers songfest settles down to weightier matters after Roy returns to the old homestead to perform a radio broadcast. Peace and quiet, however, are rudely interrupted when someone kidnaps the cowboy crooner's famous horse Trigger and demands a $100,000 ransom for the handsome equine. The perpetrators of this dastardly deed are horse traders "Pop" Jordan (George Lloyd) and Lige McFarland (Wade Crosby), who employ a mole at the Rogers outfit in the person of young Ted Conover (Michael Chapin), Lige's innocent stepson, who will do anything to recover the imperiled Trigger. When not chasing down nasty kidnappers, Roy Rogers, Bob Nolan and The Sons of the Pioneers (featuring Pat Brady) and leading lady Jane Frazee perform "Under California Stars", "King of the Cowboys", and Little Saddle Pals", all by Jack Elliott. Like he had in his initial Republic starring vehicle, Under Western Stars (1938), Roy also sings Gene Autry's dramatic "Dust". Under California Stars was released in Trucolor. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

In this western, Roy Rogers plays a cowboy-congressman from a dustbowl state who travels to Washington, DC to lobby for badly needed water rights which he wants to make public and free. Roy is assisted by his sidekick and other friends. There, they show their peers a documentary that graphically depicts the decimation caused by the massive drought. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Despite its tantalizing title, Wall Street Cowboy must rank as one of the lesser Roy Rogers films. The story is set in motion by a crooked cartel of stock marketeers who hope to swindle Rogers out of his ranch. It seems that his property is rich with the valuable mineral molybdenum, which the villains want to use for their steel-mining activities. Unable to pay his mortgage thanks to the chicanery of fiancier Niles (Ivan Miller), Roy must rely on the help of an old enemy-turned-friend named Hammond (Pierre Watkin). With a plot that seems more suitable to Charlie Sheen and Michael Douglas than Roy Rogers, Wall Street Cowboy is a major disappointment when compared to the star's promising earlier efforts. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this engagingly silly musical fantasy from the waning days of WW2, Fred MacMurray stars as Bill, who wants to serve his country but has been classified 4-F. While working at a local USO, Bill falls in love with the fickle Lucilla (June Haver, soon to be Mrs. Fred MacMurray), never realizing that he himself is worshipped from afar by the sensible Sally (Joan Leslie). Stumbling across an old lamp donated to a scrap drive, Bill impulsively rubs the lamp--and out pops Ali (Gene Sheldon), a bibulous, bumbling genie. Hoping to become a hero in Lucilla's eyes, Bill asks Ali to put him in the US Army. The genie complies, but gets his wires crossed, and Bill ends up in the Continental Army during the Revolutionary War. In short order, Bill meets two lookalikes of the girls in his life at "Ye U.S.O.", shows up at Valley Forge and trades quips with General Washington (Alan Mowbray)--who, in anticipation of MacArthur and Eisenhower, bombastically insists that he has no political aspirations--unsuccessfully tries to alert Washington of the duplicity of Benedict Arnold (John Davidson), and ultimately finds himself behind enemy lines with a troop of Hessians, whom he tries to hoodwink by delivering a Nuremberg-style speech, replete with "Sieg Heils." Arrested and sentenced to a Hessian firing squad, Bill again summons Ali, who whisks him off to the year 1492. In an elaborate "opera bouffe", Bill musically dissuades the sailors serving under Christopher Columbus (Fortunio Bonanova) from staging a mutiny, convincing them to continue seeking out the New World (as represented by a group of Cuban natives in a conga line). Once on dry land, Bill is entranced by a comely Indian maiden who looks a lot like Lucilla, only to be entrapped in an old-fashioned "badger game" cooked up by the girl's wily Native American boyfriend (Anthony Quinn). Buying his way out of an embarrassing situation by agreeing to purchase Manhattan Island for $24, Bill is then transported to "New Amsterdam" in the mid-1600s. In his efforts to persuade the local Dutch elders that he is the rightful owner of Manhattan, Bill succeeds only in getting arrested again. This time, however, the drunken Ali manages to zap our hero back to the 20th Century--with the 17th-century equivalent of Sally in tow. The songs, by Kurt Weill and Ira Gershwin, are appropriately bright and satirical, but none are standouts. Still, Where Do We Go From Here? is one of those frothy 1940s concoctions that is absolutely impossible to dislike. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This Roy Rogers vehicle is a followup (though not a sequel) to 1940's Young Buffalo Bill. Definitely a "premature anti-fascist", singing frontiersman Bill Hickok (Roy Rogers) tries to thwart the takeover of West by foreign invaders. John Miljan is frontier fuhrer Nicholas Tower, who hires a gang of storm troopers-er, henchmen-to do his dirty work. Southern belle Louise Mason (Jacqueline Wells) initially aligns herself with Tower because he is ostensibly anti-Damyankee, but she finally turns against him when she realizes what he's up to. Calamity Jane also appears in the person of comic actress Sally Payne, while Gabby Hayes shows up as a character named-but of course-Gabby. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide