Cactus Mack Movies

Ginger Rogers ended her 23-year association with RKO Radio with the indifferent musical comedy western The First Travelling Saleslady. Ginger and Broadway favorite Carol Channing (whose only starring film this was) play a pair of corset salespersons who head westward in 1897 to hawk their wares. Finding a limited market for corsets, the ladies switch to selling barbed wire, which rests not at all well with cattle baron James Arness. Rescuing Ginger and Carol from Arness' hired guns are horseless-carriage inventor Barry Nelson and callow young cowpoke Clint Eastwood. Whenever asked about First Travelling Saleslady in later years, Carol Channing would blithely refer to it as "the picture that killed RKO"; she wasn't too far wrong in this assessment. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Western star Donald Barry was both producer and leading man of The Dalton Gang. Barry is cast as straight-arrow marshal Larry West, who braces himself against an invasion by the notorious Daltons. He is backed up by sheriff Jeb Marvin (James Millican), while Polly (Betty Adams) waits tensely on the sidelines (Adams would later enjoy considerable success under her new nom de film of Julie Adams). When the much-anticipated showdown comes, West and Marvin receive unexpected aid from a friendly Indian tribe. Curiously, none of the actors playing the Daltons are afforded screen credit: in fact, except for a few long shots, they're barely in the film. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

A Texas Ranger is once again falsely accused of murder in this above-average singing-cowboy oater from Monogram. This time, the unfortunate gent is Jimmy Wakely, who, along with his band of ex-Rangers, battle the new corrupt police force that briefly replaced the Texas Rangers corps. Unbeknownst to Commissioner Jed Brant (Steve Clark), the new State Police is actually strong-arming the local ranchers and Jimmy and his former colleagues have become a threat to this lucrative side business. The brain behind the crimes is Brant's second-in-command, Captain Barton (Marshall Reed), who plots with his henchman Hamen (Pierce Lyden) to frame Jimmy in the killing of a couple of ex-Rangers. Even Jimmy's best friends, Vic Sanders (Riley Hill), Brant's nephew, and his fiancée Sheila (Virginia Belmont) begin to suspect their friend of wrong-doings, especially after the commissioner himself is found murdered. Aided by his friend Cannonball (Dub Taylor), however, Jimmy manages to extract a confession from the slimy Hamen and the game is up. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi

When Republic moved its popular star William Elliot from "B" series westerns to "A" frontier specials, a lot of the fun and excitement was lost in the process. Additionally, Republic seemed reluctant to admit the new Elliot films were westerns, as witness the title Gallant Legion, which could have been mistaken for a Sahara Desert epic. Actually Gallant Legion is one of the better Elliot big-budgeters, with Bill as one of the charter members of the Texas Rangers. The Rangers' task is to prevent greedy landgrabbers from dividing Texas into sections and setting up their own fiefdoms. Elliot's leading lady in Gallant Legion is Adrian Booth, who as "Lorna Gray" had been a Republic serial villainess a few seasons earlier. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Johnny Mack Brown races to the rescue in the Monogram western Raiders of the South. But we're a bit ahead of ourselves here: we should explain that Johnny has come to the aid of helpless settlers who've been victimized by a vigilante group. The mysterious masked leader turns out be...but wait, we're gettting ahead of ourselves again. Featured in the cast is former silent screen star Evelyn Brent, and Superman's Perry White, aka John Hamilton. Raiders of the South benefits from the production polish indigenous to producer Scott R. Dunlap and director Lambert Hillyer. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

An exemplary "Red Ryder" Western, Stagecoach to Denver features Red (Allan Lane), his aunt, the Duchess (Martha Wentworth), and Little Beaver (Bobby Blake) caring for Dickie Ray (Bobby Hyatt), a young child who has broken his back in a stagecoach collision that also took the life of Land Commissioner Felton (Edward Cassidy). Unbeknownst to the people of Elkhorn, stage owner Big Bill Lambert (Roy Barcroft) had arranged the "accident" in order to get rid of the pesky land commissioner who threatened to ruin his plans for controlling all communication between Elkhorn and Denver. Little Dickie requires an operation but Doc Kimball (Tom Chatterton) needs the consent from his nearest relative, Denver resident May Barnes (Marin Sais), whom the boy has never met. Since she is scheduled to arrive on the same stage as the new land commissioner, Taylor (Tom Chatterton), Aunt May poses a problem for Big Bill, who has them both kidnapped and replaced with his own people, Wally (Stanley Price) and Beautiful (Peggy Stewart). The latter feels sorry for little Dickie and is ready to bail but Big Bill forces her to go through with the deception. The boy survives his operation, of course, and Big Bill's treachery is eventually revealed. But Beautiful pays a rather heavy price for her part of the deception when she takes a bullet meant for Bobby. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi

In this western, a wagonmaster stops a greedy newspaper editor from buying up an entire territory. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

In his third western for Republic Pictures, Allan Lane plays Tex Jordan, a cattle rancher en route to sell his stock to cattle baron Jack Hatfield (Roy Barcroft). But in the town of Sundown, our hero finds that the omnipotent Hatfield has been squeezing the small ranchers in general and Tex's friend Andy Craig (Jack Kirk) in particular. Andy, who threatens to blow the whistle on Hatfield's unfair business practices, is shot by persons unknown and Tex promises his dying friend to care for a young daughter, Little Jo (Twinkle Watts). Appealing the case to the governor (Herbert Rawlinson), Tex is made a special investigator but due to a lack of physical evidence, Hatfield continues his reign of terror almost unopposed. Until, that is, Tex and sidekick Chihuahua (Duncan Renaldo) concoct a plan to trap the evil empire builder. Sheriff of Sundown reunited Allan Lane with Linda Stirling, his co-star in the contemporary Republic serial The Tiger Woman (1944). ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi

In his second starring Western, Republic's newest cowboy hero Allan Lane went up against Roy Barcroft, the studio's master villain. Lane plays Chick Weaver, a Treasury Department agent whose stagecoach is stopped at gunpoint by Dan (Bud Geary), a hired gun searching for a man named Redmond. As Chick learns in town, Dan is employed by saloon owner Black Jack Barstow (LeRoy Mason). The latter is in cahoots with yet another passenger from the stage, J. Rodney Stevens (Barcroft), head of the U.S. Silver Foundation, which Stevens admits to Barstow is a bogus operation to cheat the local miners out of their strikes, a plan that may be ruined by the mysterious Mr. Redmond. Redmond, of course, proves to be none other than Chick the treasury agent, who has been tracking Stevens all along. Working with another undercover agent, Throckmorton "Other Hand" Snodgrass (Wally Vernon), and local journalist Jessie Wade (Peggy Stewart), Chick gets the goods on both Stevens and Barstow, who are harshly dealt with in the final shootout. A good script and no-nonsense direction by Lesley Selander was almost sabotaged by sidekick Wally Vernon, whose New York accent was out of place in a B-Western, and the precocious Twinkle Watts -- Republic's less than successful answer to Shirley Temple and Jane Withers. Her presence in this and other Westerns was vehemently opposed by their target audience, the small fry. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi

Starring the engaging Donald Barry (nicknamed, for obvious reasons, "Red"), this average Republic Western was filmed on-location at the Iverson Ranch in Chatsworth, CA. Barry, a James Cagney look-alike, played a Pinkerton agent masquerading as a criminal in order to infiltrate a gang of counterfeiters that is using wealthy widow Lucy Randall (Helen MacKellar) as a front. Arriving at the Dawson ranch, the gang's hideout, Red discovers that the counterfeiting ring is headed by J. Richard Spencer (Ian Keith), the innocent Mrs. Randall's attorney, and Dawson himself (Ted Adams). With assistance from girl reporter Lynn Parsons (Linda Johnson), Red bests the counterfeiters, discovering along the way that he is Mrs. Randall's long-lost son. Voted a top ten Western star by the Motion Picture Herald in 1942, 1943, and 1944, Barry usually benefited from good supporting casts, this time including the veteran Ian Keith and former stage star Helen MacKellar. Leading lady Linda Johnson replaced an ailing Lynn Merrick, Barry's usual co-star. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi

Overland Mail Robbery is another entry in Republic's "Wild Bill" Elliot western series. Once again, Elliot's leading lady is Anne Jeffreys, and once again his comical sidekick is Gabby Hayes. The plot finds Wild Bill coming to the aid of namby-pamby Easterner Tom Hartley (played by future "Superman" Kirk Alyn), who has inherited his family's stagecoach line. With Elliot's assistance, Tom proves he's a real he-man by standing up to the outlaw gang terrorizing the countryside. Of interest is the fact that the gang leader is a woman, played by Alice Fleming, who later portrayed "The Duchess" in Republic's "Red Ryder" series. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

In this western, Roy plays both the villain and the hero. As the bad-guy, he heads a ring of rustlers. The trouble begins when the gang runs across good-Roy and mistake him for their wicked leader. Good-Roy plays along so he can bring the gang to justice. Unfortunately, bad-Roy shows up and mayhem ensues. Fortunately good-Roy prevails and justice is served, but not before he sings a few cowboy songs. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi