The Trail Beyond (1934)

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Good concept, poorly executed.

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

. . . watching Fox "News," with BEYOND's trios of guys shooting at each other during Great Canoe Chases and packs of gunmen firing a whole War's worth of bullets as their horses bite the dust left and right. Frequent references to "half-breeds" are thrown around, and the Dead keep popping back into the Land of the Living during BEYOND. But viewing Fox "News" before and after BEYOND, things are equally mashed up in its version of Real Life, 2016. First, one cop is dead, and some guy wearing a young D. "Rock" Johnson mask is identified as the shooter at large. Then, two officers have expired, done in by a couple of guys who fled in a Mercedes. Next, three Men in Blue have passed, and there's a lady in the ring of DPD attackers. Fox then says four policemen are fatalities, and a cornered rifleman has shot himself dead. Finally, Fox reports that ONE Veteran Gone Bad exterminated FIVE police, who blew him up with a robotic bomb! During BEYOND, the "half-breed" is a killer, but at least he has a girl. Then Mr. Multi-Racial's "victim" miraculously revives, but John Wayne steals his chick because she's inheriting a gold mine AND a cattle ranch! After the Mountie they're holding at gunpoint is fatally shot, Wayne prevents his corpse from going over a huge waterfall, so it revives (unlike BEYOND's main villain, who rolls off a cliff after a cop shoots him for picking up a rock!). Ask yourself, WWRD? (That is, What Would Rambo Do?)

"The Trail Beyond" is one of many low-budget western B-movies made by John Wayne during the 1930s. Rather unusually for a Western, however, this one is set in Canada. No doubt the 19th-century Canadian West offered as many challenges to settlers as the American West, and gave rise to as many adventures, but in general Hollywood tended to ignore any part of the North American continent lying north of the 49th parallel. (Apart, of course, from Alaska). Here Wayne's character Rod Drew and his friend Wabi travel to Northern Canada searching for a long-lost gold miner and his missing daughter. A complication arises, however, when they are falsely accused of murder and pursued by the Mounties. ("Wabi" is presumably an American Indian name as the character is said to be half-Indian. As, however, the name is pronounced "Wobbie" I assumed that he was really called "Robbie" but spoke with a lisp). The film exhibits many of the weaknesses I have come to associate with "Poverty Row" westerns, namely:-A hackneyed, cliché-ridden plot, in this case revolving around a treasure map, a gold mine and a gang of villains out to steal the treasure from its rightful owner. Ethnically stereotyped bad guys, in this case French-Canadians with accents as villainous as their personalities. (Well, at least it makes a change from casting Mexicans or Indians as the villains). Dubious acting skills. Even Wayne does little to suggest a major star in the making. Lack of attention to period detail. Most of the cast wear generic late 19th century Western costumes, but at one point we see Rod and Wabi wearing 1930s-style lounge suits while travelling in a train of distinctly 20th century vintage. Badly choreographed fist-fights. It would appear from watching this film that an extremely effective fighting technique, and one guaranteed to knock your opponent off his feet, is to punch the air about six inches away from his nose. Some of the stunts, however, are well done, and the film does have one feature not normally associated with Poverty Row. Most B-movie Westerns of this period were filmed on a Hollywood back lot, but this one was obviously shot on location against a background of real forests, lakes and mountains. Admittedly, filming took place around Mammoth Lakes, California, around twenty degrees of latitude further south than the film's ostensible setting, but much of the photography is in fact strikingly attractive. It is this feature which is responsible for the film getting a higher mark from me than it otherwise would have done. 5/10

With a bigger budget than other movies of John Wayne's of this period, this 55 minute programmer has a more interesting story and higher production values than those others.The version I saw, on TCM had a very clean and crisp transfer and even looked like it had been restored.The story goes something like this: John Wayne travels to Canada in search of a missing miner and his daughter, but ends up a fugitive when he helps a friend who has been framed for murder to escape the law. In a deserted mountain cabin, complete with skeletons, they stumble on a treasure map. Deciding to go after the loot, they're on the run again, until a devious trapper plans to get his hands on it by posing as a mountie.There's some wonderful scenery (pity it's not later and in Technicolor) that rather takes over from the story but that's no bad thing and is a nice change from the dust and Indians of your usual western.The Duke's delivery of his lines are stilted and rather wooden but he's unsurpassed at mounting a horse whilst running - and from the back of the animal, which arguably is far more important than eloquent dialogue!Though hardly a classic and probably a bit pretty for young boys wanting 'cowboys'n'indians' action, The Trail Beyond remains quite watchable.

This is a terrific Monogram-Lone Star western from 1934 which for some reason has me quite enchanted. I find the whole look and tone of the film like a comic book from my childhood; and it is the imagination struck from this that has me remembering scenes for days later. I know it is not a lot different from a zillion other 55 minute westerns of the 30s from poverty row, but this one has several compelling factors: A tall, young and handsome John Wayne in really groovy jeans and shirts, Noah beery Jr whose modern hair style sees him look like a young Warren Beatty, astoundingly glorious photography of mountains streams mighty waterfalls and incredible jaw-dropping horse-over-the-cliff stunts, hilarious PepeLePew French Canadian baddies, a great scene with 2 skeletons at a table; and very inventive camera angles and clear- lake water photography. THE TRAIL BEYOND is a real time travel western and the viewer can really feel the time and place. I show this surprise gem to many modern friends who are equally astonished. If there are many more of this caliber I want to see them. THE TRAIL BEYOND is worth the journey.