Tim McCoy Movies

Again forsaking his traditional western garb, Tim McCoy plays a rough-and-ready fireman in Columbia's A Man's Game. During one blaze, Tim and his partner Dave (Ward Bond) rescue pretty stenographer Judy (Evelyn Knapp). Falling in love with the girl, the boys try to save her from getting mixed up in an embezzlement scheme. The plot requires Judy to set off a fire herself to rout the villains, which of course also brings Tim and Dave back into the picture. As was his custom, director D. Ross Lederman deftly combines newly shot scenes with stock footage of genuine fires (one of which pops up three different times in the film!) ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Monogram Pictures launched its lucrative "Rough Riders" western series with 1941's Arizona Bound. Producer Scott Dunlap hoped to attract new customers by teaming two of the most popular cowboy stars in the movies, Buck Jones and Tim McCoy, throwing in another old favorite, Raymond Hatton, as grizzled comedy relief (ironically, Hatton was actually younger than his two costars!) The first entry set the pattern of all the "Rough Riders" entries to follow: Apparently retired, gunslinger Buck Roberts (Buck Jones) is galvanized into action when an old friend asks him to help rid Mesa City of a scurrilous outlaw gang. Upon his arrival, Buck makes the acquaintance of local parson Tim McCall (McCoy) and itinerant ranchhand Sandy Hopkins (Hatton). It soon becomes obvious that Buck, Tim and Sandy have been working together all along, with Roberts doing most of the shootin' and fightin' while Tim and Sandy operate undercover and undetected. Their job finally done, our three heroes bid farewell to one another and go their separate ways, with the promise that they'll join up again whenever its becomes necessary. Though it seldom deviated from this basic formula, the "Rough Riders" series was a hit, and remained so until Buck Jones' untimely death in 1942. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Razzle-dazzle showman Michael Todd hocked everything he had to make this spectacular presentation of Jules Verne's 1872 novel Around the World in 80 Days, the second film to be lensed in the wide-screen Todd-AO production. Nearly as fascinating as the finished product are the many in-production anecdotes concerning Todd's efforts to pull the wool over the eyes of local authorities in order to cadge the film's round-the-world location shots--not to mention the wheeling and dealing to convince over forty top celebrities to appear in cameo roles. David Niven heads the huge cast as ultra-precise, supremely punctual Phileas Fogg, who places a 20,000-pound wager with several fellow members of London Reform Club, insisting that he can go around the world in eighty days (this, remember, is 1872). Together with his resourceful valet Passepartout (Cantinflas), Fogg sets out on his world-girdling journey from Paris via balloon. Meanwhile, suspicion grows that Fogg has stolen his 20,000 pounds from Bank of England. Diligent Inspector Fix (Robert Newton) is sent out by the bank's president (Robert Morley) to bring Fogg to justice. Hopscotching around the globe, Fogg pauses in Spain, where Passepartout engages in a comic bullfight (a specialty of Cantinflas). In India, Fogg and Passepartout rescue young widow Princess Aouda (Shirley MacLaine, in her third film) from being forced into committing suicide so that she may join her late husband. The threesome visit Hong Kong, Japan, San Francisco, and the Wild West. Only hours short of winning his wager, Fogg is arrested by the diligent Inspector Fixx. Though exonerated of the bank robbery charges, he has lost everything--except the love of the winsome Aouda. But salvation is at hand when Passepartout discovers that, by crossing the International Date Line, there's still time to reach the Reform Club. Will they make it? See for yourself. Among the film's 46 guest stars, the most memorable include Marlene Dietrich, Charles Boyer, Jose Greco, Frank Sinatra, Peter Lorre, Red Skelton, Buster Keaton, John Mills, and Beatrice Lillie. All were paid in barter--Ronald Colman did his brief bit for a new car. Newscaster Edward R. Murrow provides opening narration, and there's a tantalizing clip from Georges Méliès' A Trip to the Moon (1902). Offering a little something for everyone, Around the World in 80 Days is nothing less than an extravaganza, and it won 5 Oscars, including Best Picture and Best Cinematography. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

During the 1933-34 season, Columbia Pictures attempted to place its resident western star Tim McCoy in contemporary roles. Beyond the Law finds McCoy cast as a modern-day railroad detective. When ex-convict Addison Richards is framed for a train robbery, Richards' daughter Shirley Grey plays up to McCoy, hoping to throw him off the track (so to speak). McCoy falls in love with Grey, and sets about to prove her dad's innocence. Beyond the Law is essentially a western in mufti, so who better to direct than action maven D. Ross Lederman? ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

After two well-mounted entries produced by Nat Ross, the Tim McCoy Westerns from Puritan Pictures were taken over by the penny-pinching Sigmund Neufeld and the drop in quality was immediately detectable. McCoy played a dual role, as father and son. The elder McCoy, Slim Braddock, turns to robbing stagecoaches after a crooked banker, Williams (Karl Hackett), tricked him out of his gold mine. Mortally wounded during one of the robberies, Braddock drags himself to the shack where he lives with his young son, Tim (Eddie Buzzard), who promises to avenge him. Tim grows up to look exactly like his late father and defends miner Pete Brennan (John W. Cowell) against the still scheming Williams. Pete's daughter, Helen (Joan Woodbury), is in favor of selling out to the Jepson Mining Company but Jepson (Edmund Cobb) is in league with Williams. When his offer to buy is turned down, Jepson blows up the mine. While Tim manages to escape before the explosion, Williams is not so lucky and is killed. Jepson, meanwhile, is captured and sent off to face justice. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Colonel Tim McCoy's third western for MGM starred the former Indian sign language interpreter as an army captain facing demotion until successfully defeating a gang of Mexican cutthroats. Set in old California, the film depicted several real-life American heroes, including Kit Carson (Fred Warren) and Brig. Gen. Stephen Kearney (played by Romaine Fielding who, for now obscure reasons, billed himself Edwin Terry). The only series western star MGM ever had, McCoy enjoyed five releases in 1927 alone. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Code of the Rangers was one of four Monogram westerns of the 1937-38 season starring the venerable Tim McCoy. In this one, Texas Ranger Tim Strong (McCoy) tries his best to straigthen out his hotheaded brother Jack (Rex Lease). Things don't work out, and before long Tim is protecting Jack from a bank-robbery charge. Taking the blame for the theft, our hero is exonerated only by a last-minute confession from his wayward sibling. There's lots of fisticuffs and gunplay in Code of the Rangers, enabling viewers to forget the film's threadbare production values and banal plotline. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Although based on a story by William Colt McDonald, the creator of The Three Mesqueteers, this Tim McCoy effort from Columbia was a conventional Western at best. McCoy played Tim Madigan, a cowpoke coming to the aid of Jerry Norris (Alberta Vaughn), whose father (Murdock MacQuarrie) is in trouble with a gang of cattle rustlers. The leaders of the rustlers, Hugo Distang (Robert Ellis) and Bull Bagley (Richard Alexander), prove to be the very same villains Madigan was trailing. Aided by a new friend, Jughandle (Wallace MacDonald), Madigan manages to catch the rustlers red-handed. The bandits are carted off to jail and Jughandle proves to be an agent for the Cattlemen's Association. McCoy offered a competent and believable performance but this time the material was not quite up to his usual high standard. Future Three Stooges menace Vernon Dent appeared as an ill-fated bartender. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Monogram's "Rough Riders" rolled along smoothly with the 1942 entry Down Texas Way. Once again, the star trio consists of Buck Jones as Buck Roberts, Tim McCoy as Tim McCall, and Raymond Hatton as Sandy Hopkins. The plot, as always, finds Buck, Tim and Sandy cast as undercover US Marshals who pretend to be strangers to one another for the purpose of confounding the villains. This time, Sandy is framed for murder by a gang of frontier racketeers who hope to take over a small town as their headquarters. Working separately (and ostensibly on the wrong side of the law), Buck and Tim rescue Sandy from a lynch mob and foil the crooks' dastardly schemes. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this complicated western, a group of explorers head to Mexico to hunt for an Indian burial ground. The hero, who has been unjustly accused of murdering the leader of the first expedition, begins impersonating the notorious bandito El Puma. He intercepts the latest expedition just as the leader is stabbed. The real murderer then blames it on El Puma. Now the hero stands accused of two murders. The hero begins looking for the treasure buried within the grounds and for the real killer. He finds both. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

A standard Tim McCoy Western from Columbia Pictures, Fighting for Justice featured the stalwart McCoy as a cowboy whose late father was cheated out of his ranch by an unscrupulous tax attorney, Trout (Hooper Atchley). Falsifying the Bar A Ranch tax records, Trout, who is in league with Bull Barnard (Harry Cording), whose Drury River Gang has been terrorizing the area, attempts to break up the friendship between Tim and the ranch owner's daughter, Amy Tracey (Joyce Compton). The ploy fails miserably and the villains are brought to justice. Better known for playing a series of ditzy Southern belles, blond Joyce Compton made a very conventional prairie heroine this time around. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

The "Rough Riders"-Buck Jones, Tim McCoy and Raymond Hatton-are back in the saddle in Forbidden Trails. As was customary, the stars play three wildly diverse types who are apparently strangers to one another when the film begins. In this instance, Buck Roberts (Jones) is a dude gambler, Tim McCall (McCoy) is head driver for a stagecoach line, and Sandy Hopkins (Hatton) is a desert rat who's apparently in cahoots with a pair of escaped outlaws. By Reel Four, however, it is obvious that Buck, Tim and Sandy are secretly working together to thwart the villains. In the film's most exciting scene, Buck is trapped in a burning shack while a contingent of well-armed bandits block his escape. Future "Three Stooges" heroine Christine McIntyre is the leading lady on this occasion. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide