Charles Brinley Movies

One of the more original aspects of the Charles Starrett western Texas Stampede is that perennial Starrett-series villain Dick Curtis isn't in the film. Another is its lack of overt violence; even nominal heavy Wayne Cameron (Fred Kohler Jr.) isn't such a bad fellow, and ends up shaking hands with hero Tom Randall. Otherwise, the plot is the usual cattlemen vs. sheepherders affair, with hero Tom Randall (Starrett) trying to bring peace to the territory. Returnees from previous Starrett vehicles include heroine Iris Meredith, Hank Bell and Edmund Cobb. Texas Stampede was photographed by Lucien Ballard, who later lent his talents to such bigger-budgeted westerns as True Grit and Wild Bunch. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this western, a brave hero stops a range war from erupting between homesteaders who are encroaching upon ranchers' land. Much of the trouble is stirred up by greedy outlaws. The hero brings them all to justice, romances a pretty girl and even has time to sing "Serenade to the Night Bird" and "Westward, Ho" (Bob Nolan, Tim Spencer). ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

By 1937, everyone was tired of films about silent stars who couldn't make the transition to talkies (and would be until Singin' in the Rain), but this Columbia comedy-drama still had its moments in spite of gross inaccuracies. Richard Dix is Western star Tim Bart, a screen hero who is adored by children everywhere. All that changes when sound comes in -- outdoor pictures are risky because of sound problems and Bart's screen test proves that he can't possibly play indoorsy society men. On the other hand, his co-star Gloria Gay (Fay Wray) is a natural for glamour. The studio offers to keep Bart on if he will play gangsters and bank robbers, but he refuses to let his young fans down by becoming a bad guy. (All this makes you want to ask, "What about 1930's Academy Award-winning Cimarron, in which Dix was the star?" The writers at Columbia must have had extremely short memories!) Bart's career dries up, while Gloria's flourishes -- at least for a while. With his ranch foreclosed and no work forthcoming, Bart decides to leave Hollywood. But then, Billy (Billy Burrud) shows up on his doorstep -- he's one of the kids Bart visited in a hospital. The boy has no family and begs to stay, so Bart relents. He even throws Billy a party which is attended by all the stars of the day (actually they're the stars' doubles, but Billy never guesses). Gloria also shows up and admits that her career is on the outs, too. The desperate Bart walks into a bank just as it's being robbed. He gets into a shoot-out with the crooks and becomes a real-life hero. With his name in all the papers -- and Westerns once again a popular commodity -- the studio signs him up to a new contact, along with Gloria. Franklin Pangborn does one of his amusing turns in a bit part as a dialog coach. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide

A rather weak entry in Tim McCoy's Columbia oeuvre, this Western was released to smaller venues in December of 1934, but not widely shown until 1936. McCoy, a rather stolid type of cowboy hero, is rather miscast as a rodeo performer competing for the affection of Juanita Barnes (Marion Shilling) with Bob Lockhart (Joe Sawyer). Juanita chooses the latter, but comes to regret her decision when she discovers that she really loves Tim. Meanwhile, Tim's father, Zack (Edward J. LeSaint), is killed by the rodeo rider's horse, Midnight. With his inheritance, Tim buys the ranch next to Senator Lockhart (John H. Dilson), Bob's father, and has a run-in with Lockhart's crooked foreman, Wallace (Hooper Atchley). There is a fight during which Bob is badly injured. Tim is arrested but escapes with the assistance of Uncle Ben, an old family retainer (Harry Todd). Together, they learn that Zack's death was no accident, and that the sheriff (Albert J. Smith) may be implicated. After the climactic shootout, Bob's name is cleared, the villains apprehended, and Tim free to pursue a future with Juanita. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Adapted from an earlier European film, Wharf Angel stars Dorothy Dell as Toy, a golden-hearted prostitute stranded in San Francisco. Toy finds hope for redemption when she falls in love with Como (Preston S. Foster), a sailor on the lam from a murder charge. In Madame Butterfly fashion, the heroine promises to wait for Como until he is able to clear himself. The fly in the ointment is Como's buddy Turk (Victor McLaglen), who has known Toy (in the Biblical sense) for several years. An inexpensive but fairly credible reconstruction of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake (courtesy of legendary art director William Cameron Menzies) caps this intriguing little romantic melodrama. Alas, leading lady Dorothy Dell was killed in a car crash after appearing in only three films. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In his third Allied Pictures release of 1932, veteran screen cowboy Hoot Gibson played his favorite role, that of a happy-go-lucky rodeo rider. This time, Gibson plays Johnny Ringo, a former lawman turned rodeo champ who returns to the old homestead to find his brother Bud (longtime Gibson protegee Fred Gilman) in trouble with a couple of crooked livestock-brokers cum cattle rustlers (Hooper Atchley and Al Bridge). Pretending to be a bumbling fool -- a favorite Gibson ploy -- "The Hooter" gains access to the villains' lair and is able to rescue a pretty kidnap victim (Doris Hill). ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

A fine early sound Western, this Buck Jones series entry from his Columbia period told the well-known story of a feud between cattle barons and sheep men. When Mart Denton (Charles Morton), son of a wealthy cattle man, kills a homesteader during a quarrel, Sheriff Larry Williams (Jones) faces a difficult dilemma. The sheriff is not only Mart's best friend but also engaged to the young man's sister, June (Miriam Seegar). But the law is the law and Mart is arrested. The angry cattlemen help the youngster escape and Larry is wounded. The escaped prisoner, however, is later killed by his own father (Erville Alderson) who mistakes him for one of the sheepherders. This final tragedy helps bring the old feud to a peaceful conclusion. Although the story was hardly new, The Dawn Trail was told forthrightly by veteran director W. Christy Cabanne who stretched realism over romance. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Producer-director J.P. McGowan's Syndicate Film Exchange, a forerunner of Monogram Productions, Inc., caught action heroes on their way down or up -- mostly down. Covered Wagon Trails, one of the last full-length silent westerns produced, starred the laconic Bob Custer, a screen cowboy whose career was decidedly in the doldrums. The story wasn't exactly fresh either, something about a cowboy battling smugglers -- and heroine Phyllis Bainbridge's weakling brother (Perry Murdock) -- on the Mexican border. This below-average modern-dress oater was far from the sweeping epic the title suggests but did come with a synchronized music score. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

An early sound film for flapper star Olive Borden, this low-budget effort from FBO featured the erstwhile "Joy Girl" as Zarah, "a beautiful Arabian" saving irrigation engineer Bob Winslow (Hugh Trevor) from being abducted by bandit leader Abdullah (Noah Beery). The latter naturally takes umbrage to this and threatens a massacre if Zarah does not return as his bride. The plucky girl does return but is rescued in the nick of time by Bob, who kills Abdullah in a climactic fistfight. A 1925 Wampas baby Star, brunette Olive Borden became one of the many victims of the sound revolution and ended her life on Los Angeles' Skid Row. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Based on a 1921 story by Jackson Gregory, this silent Western starred Buck Jones as Montgomery Wilson Fitzsmith, a roaming cowboy who comes to the aid of a beleaguered group of Desert Valley ranchers who are fighting an unscrupulous capitalist, Jefferson Hoades (Malcolm Waite). Hoades has cornered the valley's costly water supply, but before Fitzsmith can join the side of the righteous, he most prove himself innocent of stealing a pie. With sheriff's deputy Eugene Pallette in hot pursuit, our hero encounters Mildred Dean (Virginia Brown Faire), whose father (J.W. Johnston), is put on trial for breaking the water pipeline. Fitzsmith gallops back to town and proves that the real culprit is Hoades. A chase ensues, and Fitzsmith bests the evil Hoades in a well-staged fistfight. Having signed with Fox in 1919, Buck Jones would become that studio's runner-up to the great Tom Mix. By the mid 1920s, Jones was almost rivaling Mix's popularity, having adopted a less flamboyant but still pleasing style of his own. Jones' stardom lasted until his tragic death in a Boston nightclub fire in 1942. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Returning to the homestead, lower-echelon cowboy star Bill Cody finds the place taken over by cattle rustlers, one of whom (George Magrill) is a boyhood pal. The man reforms on his deathbed, however, giving Cody enough ammunition to bring the gang to justice. Independent producer Jesse J. Goldburg had the foresight to hire a very young Jean Arthur to play Cody's love interest. Not that Arthur differed all that much from the run-of-the-mill prairie flower at the time; a modest brunette years away from super-stardom, she was still known off-screen under her real name, Gladys Greene. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

The epic struggle for the rights to California became the basis for Days of '49, a 15-chapter serial produced by Ben Wilson's Berwilla Corporation. The chapterplay was re-edited into this 7-reel feature Western starring Neva Gerber as Swiss settler Johan Sutter's highly fictitious but spirited daughter who falls for a handsome trail guide (Edmund Cobb). Historical episodes keep interfering the slam-bang action in this Western, such as when a group of settlers, stranded in a snow storm, poignantly implore Cobb to "try to break through -- and take our last horse, even if it will cut our food supply short!" The group in question was, of course, the ill-fated Donner Party. Constantly reminding the viewer of its serial origins, the film is often quite disjointed. In fact, Neva Gerber's "Sierra Sutter" could have been referring to California in '49, when following an Indian raid she remarked (via a title): "I shall never forget the awfulness of it all." ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide

Moran of the Lady Letty was a successful attempt to establish "Latin Lover" Rudolph Valentino as a brawling he-man hero (both this film and Valentino's breakthrough picture The Sheik were directed by George Melford). Rudy plays a Spanish aristocrat who is shanghaied by burly ship's captain Walter Long, the head of a smuggling gang. While at sea, Valentino rescues a young man from a burning vessel. The young man turns out to be a young woman (Dorothy Dalton), who had earlier spurned Valentino in his pampered-aristocrat days. Rudy tries to conceal the girl's identity from the lustful Long, but soon the truth is out, setting the stage for a bloody mano-y-mano battle between hero and villain. Moran of the Lady Letty was based on a novel by Frank Norris, whose best-known work McTeague was filmed by Erich Von Stroheim as Greed (1924). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide