Death Valley Rangers (1943)

Good movie, but best of all time? Hardly . . .

It is not deep, but it is fun to watch. It does have a bit more of an edge to it than other similar films.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

This is a gorgeous movie made by a gorgeous spirit.

When Charles King and Wally West are just two of the "withs," you know you have a great cast. And usually that means a great movie.Yes, it's not "Ben-Hur" or "Gone With the Wind." Yes, it's a B Western, but in my not-very-humble opinion, that's the top of the line of movie entertainment.Ken Maynard, Hoot Gibson, and Bob Steele were simply among the best of the celluloid cowboys. With even one of them, a movie had to be good. With all three, you know there will be action and fun."Death Valley Rangers" -- somewhat of a generic title, but not detracting -- is a well-directed story, with some twists and turns, some shtick from the three main characters ("Say, I've got an idea!"), and lots of great riding, some really good stunts, and one GREAT stunt, with some beautiful non-Death Valley scenery, well photographed.In addition, one of the prettiest of the thrown-in-for-good-measure girls to appear in a series B Western, Linda Brent, was along to ... well, mostly to look pretty and to give Bob Steele his usual chance at thwarted romance, which was his character's fate in this series."Death Valley Rangers" is really fun, and it is well-done fun. Low budget? Sure. Quickly made? Yes. But it is still a cut above and is, as I said, well-done fun. I recommend it, and you can see it where I did, at YouTube.

The three stars have a very likable screen presence - even Ken Maynard who evidently was a unlikable man in real life. Their outings are always watchable; however, in this case the storyline is pretty ordinary, the dialog bland and the action unexceptional. A mining company has suffered a number of stagecoach gold robberies and our trio has been hired to find out who is behind it. Bob Steele goes undercover to discover who is leaking information about the shipment schedule for the gold. He discovers the culprit but has no proof. And so proof is needed. The reason for the heists is unusual but not believable. There are two scenes that are interesting - one is of Hoot (but probably his stunt double) climbing up the back of the racing stagecoach and the scene where Hoot learns he's holding onto nitroglycerin. As a previous reviewer so well noted, the fact that the nitro was on the stagecoach's bumpy ride and didn't go off is truly amazing. So, an okay way to spend an hour but not a memorable way.

This is a Trail Blazer film from Monogram which stars Ken Maynard, Hoot Gibson and Bob Steele. Series film like this that featured trios of do-gooders were pretty common in the day--with the Three Mesquiteers and the Rough Riders spurring on the creation of the Trail Blazers (the latest and shortest running of the three). I think the idea was to take several second-tier stars and combine them for greater drawing power. So, an older and less charismatic Gibson could gain renewed box office draw in such an endeavor (Gibson was big in the silents and early talkies). In every one of these films, the trio is like a group of social workers/gunslingers who seldom shoot and mostly reveal who the ACTUAL leader of the evil mob besieging the townsfolk really is. It's all very predictable and after a while there is a definite sameness to the films.In this case, a town is having problems with gold shipments being stolen. So, they hire the trio to get to the bottom of it. Of course, it will mean some of them going undercover (in this case, Bob) and it's exactly the same plot I've seen in BOTH Three Mesquiteer AND Rough Rider films! It's even been used in Gene Autry and Roy Rogers films, now that I think about it. However, what IS different is why the shipments are stolen--and it's NOT what you expect. This twist helps, but otherwise it's yet another of the same. And, unless you are the type person to want to see EVERY B-western, it's easy to skip this one as it really isn't outstanding in any way.

Late on in the film the villains are making their getaway on a stagecoach.One of the villains has a phial of nitro glycerinate on him with which to deter anyone from stopping them.Meanwhile Hoot has secreted himself in the rear of the stagecoach unknown to the villains.The stagecoach seems to hit every conceivable bump in the road,at one point dislodging all of the luggage in the back with good old Hoot,or more likely his double hanging on to a luggage strap for dear life. how the nitro did not explode blowing them all to kingdom come is a mystery known only to the scriptwriters.Maybe the idea for the famous French film with Yves Montand came from this film.This is otherwise a standard Monogram western staring the ever expanding waistlines of Hoot Gibson and Ken Maynard.