Basil Dickey Movies

A late entry in Monogram's Jimmy Wakely musical Western series, Brand of Fear features a nice performance by Gail Davis, television's Annie Oakley. Davis plays Anne Lamont, whose guardian, Marshal Black Jack Flint (Tom London), hires her as the new schoolteacher of Oreville, AZ. Black Jack, however, is really a reformed outlaw and is being blackmailed by crooked blacksmith Cal Derringer (Marshall Reed). Derringer is in league with outlaw Tom Slade (William H. Ruhl), who plans to rob a shipment of ore. On the side of law and order are trouble-shooter Jimmy Wakely and his sidekick Cannonball (Dub Taylor). They run down the villains, and with his dying breath, Derringer confesses that Black Jack was innocent of the charges leveled against him 20 years earlier and that he is actually Anne's natural father. In between battling the bad guys, Wakely finds time to sing "There's a Rainbow Over the Range" by Tim Spencer and "Cool Water" by the prolific Bob Nolan. Monogram could have done much worse than this tightly packaged piece of Western hokum, and often did. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi

Ostensibly a Jimmy Wakely musical Western -- the singer's final starring vehicle -- The Lawless Code is really a showcase for Riley Hill, a young supporting actor who had played young henchmen for years under the name Roy Harris. While Wakely is barely given enough to warble "Trail to Mexico," Hill appears front and center as Curly Blake, a young rancher whose uncle (Steve Clark) is murdered for his valuable land. Uncle and nephew had been estranged since Curly rejected an offer to sell the family spread to the Red Rock Land & Development Company. Curly is accused of the killing, but the real culprit is the company president, a smooth-talking ex-judge (Tristram Coffin). With assistance from traveling troubadour Wakely and his sidekick, Cannonball (Dub Taylor), Curly rescues lovely Rita Caldwell (Ellen Hall) from Steele's blackmailing henchmen (Kenne Duncan and Terry Frost), one of whom is made to spill the beans about the killing. Wakely and the Sheriff (Bud Osborne) set a trap for Steele, who is soon apprehended. A busy supporting player well into the television era, Riley Hill later played the recurring role of Marshal Riley on Marshall of Gunsight Pass (1950). ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi

The popular G-Men of the 1930s made a comeback in this action serial produced by Republic Pictures, starring television's future Lone Ranger, Clayton Moore. The serial, however, was not so much a showcase for the pleasant if lightweight Moore, but rather a welcome opportunity for the studio's most effective villain, the near-legendary Roy Barcroft, to strut his considerable stuff. Barcroft plays a notorious gangster who escapes from prison, and via plastic surgery, assumes the identity of the local police commissioner (also Barcroft), who he has kidnapped. The masquerade is so effective that government agents Moore and Ramsay Ames fail to catch on until the 12th and final chapter, logically entitled "Exposed." The serial was re-edited into a feature version entitled Code 645. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi

One of the most entertaining serials to be released by Republic Pictures, this mystery employed yet another inscrutable invention, a counter atomic device known as Cyclotrode X, sought after by yet another cloaked villain, The Crimson Ghost of the title. But just like the well-known criminologist Duncan Richards (Charles Quigley) and his lovely assistant Diana Farnsworth (Linda Stirling), the Saturday Matinee kids had a tough job spotting the person hiding behind the hideous disguise. The studio took no chances this time and ingeniously cast stunt-man Bud Geary to embody the villain while several actors supplied the voice, including I. Stanford Jolley, whose role was minor but who received fourth-billing and was therefore highly suspect. When The Crimson Ghost was unmasked in the 12th and final chapter, he proved to be yet another actor, Joseph Forte, who had enacted a character seemingly above suspicion. Instead of feeling cheated, however, the young target audience subconsciously enjoyed the above-average writing and fine direction by the talented William Witney and Fred C. Brannon, and no one complained. Quigley and Stirling were at the top of their serial game, and to the bemused surprise of more recent viewers, television's Lone Ranger, Clayton Moore, played one of the master villain's henchmen, a cold-hearted gangster. The Crimson Ghost was also released in an edited feature version, retitled Cyclotrode. In 1966, yet another edited version was given the title Cyclotrode X. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi

The most obvious discrepancies concerning this otherwise well-remembered cliffhanger from genre specialist Republic Pictures are the quite demure-looking leopard outfit worn by the serial's heroine, Linda Stirling, and that Darkest Africa looks suspiciously like the hills of suburban Chatsworth. Apparently, producer William J. O'Connell acquired the leopard costume on the cheap but too late for the title to be changed, and the location never really mattered to Republic's mostly juvenile target audience. Making her serial debut, Stirling's innate athleticism came in handy playing Kay Arnold, an heiress turned Jungle Goddess who helps oil company representative Allan Lane fight off a villainous competitor headed by unscrupulous attorney Fletcher Walton (LeRoy Mason) and his henchman, general store proprietor Tom Daggett (Crane Whitley). The remaining 11 chapters had either Stirling rescuing Lane from one peril after another, or vice versa. Although not quite as independently heroic as serial queens such as Pearl White and Ruth Roland, Linda Stirling came as close as anybody, which of course was Republic's goal all along. Her sex appeal, despite the demure costume, was obvious and although this was not why she had chosen the acting profession, Linda tore into her serial assignments with legendary gusto. Ironically, the native of Long Beach, CA, had begun her career studying with Ben Bard, the widower of Ruth Roland. The serial was re-edited and released in a feature version re-titled Jungle Gold. In 1951, Republic resurrected the entire chapterplay under the title Perils of the Darkest Jungle. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi

Granite-jawed Jack Holt plays himself-or at least the screen version of "himself"-in the 15-chapter Columbia serial Holt of the Secret Service. To get the goods on a counterfeiting ring, federal agent Holt poses as master criminal Nick Farrel. The villains swallow this ruse hook, line and sinker, making one wonder how they ever had the intellectual capacity to flood the US with funny money. Aided and abetted by fellow agent Kay (Evelyn Brent), who poses as "Mrs. Farrel", Holt endures numerous brushes with death, emerging from all of them with nary a hair out of place nor a crease in his well-tailored business suit. As usual, director James W. Horne injects several moments of zany comedy in the proceedings: at one point, the villains receive a valuable piece of information, whereupon they all shout "Hooray" in unison! A less intentionally amusing aspect of the film is that neither Jack Holt nor Evelyn Brent change their clothes during the serial's 4-hour length, leading one to assume that the other cast members had lost their sense of smell. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Long before the character was appropriated by Buster Crabbe, "Lightning" Bill Carson was played by Tim McCoy in a series of low-budget westerns produced by Sam Katzman. One of the last of these was Straight Shooter, filmed in the late 1930s but unreleased until 1940. This time, Carson (McCoy) goes after a ruthless outlaw gang which has stolen government bonds. Though the odds are against him, Carson gets his man-er, men. Slowly the pace of Straight Shooter to walk is the questionable comedy relief of Ben "Magpie" Corbett. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Tim McCoy is back as hard-ridin' Lighting Bill Carson in Victory Pictures' Trigger Fingers. When rustlers invade a peaceful frontier community, troubleshooter Carson is summoned to throw the rascals out. Once more indulging his penchant for disguise, our hero dresses up as a gypsy fortune-teller, complete with earring and gloriously awful mittel-European accent. Also cloaked in gypsy garb is Carson's comic assistant Magpie (Ben Corbett), whose makeup wouldn't convince a nearsighted cow. No matter: all lapses in logic are forgotten during the action-filled climax. Trigger Fingers represents one of the first film appearances by perennial B-flick heroine Joyce Bryant, who managed to survive ten years' worth of this sort of thing. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

The popular Lee Falk-Phil Davis comic strip Mandrake the Magician first came to the screen by way of a 12-chapter Columbia serial. Warren Hull stars as the top-hatted, splendidly caparisoned Mandrake, who "gestures hypnotically" to thwart his various enemies. The head villain is a mystery man known as "The Wasp," who'll stop at nothing to steal the radium-energy machine invented by kindly Professor Houston (Forbes Murray). But no matter how hard he tries, The Wasp is always one step behind the resourceful Mandrake and his hulking assistant Lothar (Al Kikume). After facing numerous perils alone and in the company of Houston's daughter Betty (Doris Weston), Mandrake ascertains the true identity of The Wasp. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Former silent screen cowboy Tom Tyler and newcomer Lon Chaney, Jr. (still billed, modestly, as Creighton Chaney) square off in this inexpensive oater produced by infamous poverty row regular Sam Katzman. Believed by the sheriff (Charles "Slim" Whitaker) to be the notorious bandit Cheyenne Tommy, Tom Wade (Tyler) is in reality an investigator for the Cattlemen's Protective Association looking into a series of cattle rustlings. Along with his dopey sidekick, Dopey (Jimmy Fox), Wade robs the rustlers of their ill-gotten gains until he is recognized by one of the gang, Girard (Chaney). After a great deal of ridin' and shootin', Tom is assisted in bringing down the gang by lovely Sally Lane (Lucile Browne), another operative working undercover as secretary to the leader of the rustlers (Theodore Lorch). The Katzman stamp of poverty is all over this Victory Pictures production, but it is fun to watch Tyler and Chaney, both of whom would later star as the mummy, Kharis, for Universal in the '40s. Director Robert F. Hill makes his usual Hitchcock-like appearance, this time as a townsman. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi

Produced by Sam Katzman's Victory Pictures, $1,000,000 Racket stars Katzman's biggest "name," ex-Olympic athlete Herman Brix. Our hero falls in with a gang of racketeers, pretending to play along with them until he can notify the authorities. Along the way, Brix falls in love with apple-cheeked Joan Barclay. Featured in the cast are veteran silent leading man Bryant Washburn as the chief heavy, and one-time 2-reel comedy star Jimmy Aubrey as a dopey crook. Herman Brix did rather better for himself in the 1940s when he changed his name to Bruce Bennett. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

An heiress on the lam, a federal agent on a mission to catch a gang of mail thieves, and Hattie McDaniel are the main ingredients in this charmingly silly low-budget thriller from the fertile brains of producer-director Sam Katzman and writer Basil Dickey. After balking at an arranged marriage, society debutante Marion Bronson (Joan Barclay) stows away on an airplane piloted by federal investigator Eric Lane (Herman Brix). After much bickering, the two are caught by the gang but Marion's quick thinking and Lane's brawn eventually save the day. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi