Border Patrol

Border Patrol finds Hopalong Cassidy together with sidekicks Andy Clyde and Jay Kirby serving as Texas Rangers guarding the Mexican. A dead Mexican national and Claudia Drake's idea that they shot the man riding the horse that the dead man was riding that she claims belonged to her sweetheart George Reeves. Even after presenting their Ranger credentials to the Mexican border cop Duncan Renaldo doesn't convince her.

But back they go across the border to an outlaw town where it's rumored a lot of Mexican laborers have gone to work. What they find is a town run by Judge Russell Simpson who makes Roy Bean look like Oliver Wendell Holmes. Fortunately for their sakes Claudia Drake has a change of mind about Hoppy and his sidekicks because Simpson doesn't recognize their status as Texas Rangers, his is the only law where he has jurisdiction.

This Hopalong Cassidy film is notable for two things, it is one of the films that featured Robert Mitchum down in the cast as one of Simpson's hired guns. The second is the performance of Russell Simpson who even as he's deadly serious about hanging Hoppy and the sidekicks still laces his 'rulings' and 'jurisprudence' with a little humor.

Definitely a must for Hopalong Cassidy and Robert Mitchum fans.

"Border Patrol" is yet another entry in the long running Hopalong Cassidy series produced by Harry "Pop" Sherman between 1935 and 1944. The "Hoppy Trio" consists of Hoppy (William Boyd), California (Andy Clyde) and Johnny Travers (Jay Kirby). This time the boys are members of the Border Patrol of the title.

The story opens with the trio coming upon a fleeing Mexican worker who has been shot trying to escape to his homeland. Mexican ranch owner Inez La Baroa (Claudia Drake) comes upon them and accuses them of murdering her ranch hand. She takes them to the Commandant of the Mexican Border Patrol (Duncan Renaldo) who straightens things out. It seems that Mexican migrant workers have been crossing the border to work in the U.S. never to be heard from again. Hoppy decides to investigate the matter.

The trail leads to the town of Siver Bullet run by a Judge Roy Bean type named Orestes Krebs (Russell Simpson) who has the boys arrested. Krebs is an everyman in the town being mayor, sheriff and judge, among others. With the aid of Inez they overpower jailer Pierce Lydon and escape. They discover that Krebs has been imprisoning the Mexican workers led by Don Enriquez Perez (George Reeves) and forcing them to work in his silver mine. Well, Hoppy and the boys soon rectify that situation.

Frequent series director Lesley Selander gives us an action packed adventure with plenty of fisticuffs and gunfights, as well as, the customary spectacular outdoor scenery which was common to the series.

This film is also notable for the screen debut of Robert Mitchum who plays a Krebs gunman. Mitchum would go on to appear in several other Hoppys before his breakthrough role in "The Story of G.I. Joe" (1944). George Reeves, who would gain greater fame as TV's "Superman", appears briefly as the leader of the Mexican workers. He too would play a variety of roles in the series, even so far as to appear as one of the "Hoppy Trio" in a couple of pictures. Russell Simpson was perhaps better known as Pa Joad in John Ford's "The Grapes of Wrath" (1940). Duncan Renaldo would shortly achieve fame as "The Cisco Kid" in a series produced by Monogram Pictures and a subsequent TV series.

Top notch Hoppy.

When the story begins, Hoppy and his partners come upon a dying man. Soon, he dies and Inez sees this and automatically assumes the trio killed him. Like the angry stereotypical women I've seen in a few of the Hopalong Cassidy films, her anger makes no sense...and she never gives them a chance to explain. She then, at gunpoint, forces them to go with her into Mexico. There, she turns them over to Mexican authorities...only to be told that she just kidnapped three Texas Rangers! And, like the angry stereotypical women trope, she STILL thinks the three are murderers!

One reason Inez is so angry is because her boyfriend went to work at a mine in the States...and he simply disappeared. The same has happened to other Mexicans....and Hoppy, California and Johnny all agree to go to the Silver Bullet Mine to look for clues. But, when they approach the mine, they are attacked and soon are before a kangaroo court bent on hanging them. Why? What's going on here?! And is there any chance for Inez to grow up and let go of her weird vendetta?!

This is a good but flawed installment. Flawed because Inez's character simply makes no sense at times. The rest of the story, however, is interesting and involves slavery...an unusual topic for a B-western. Worth seeing.

This Hoppy film seems to have more IMDb "user reviews" than any other Hoppy movie I have seen. No sense repeating the info in those seven reviews. I'd like to add these comments: The story is very simple and straight-forward. For the first 30 minutes it moves very slowly; in fact nothing much happens except that Hoppy is sent off by the Mexican authorities to find out what happened to missing Mexican laborers sent to work in a particular US town. Once at the town, Hoppy and sidekicks are "arrested," find out the misdeeds of the local crime boss, escape, and round up the bad guys.

I noticed three particularly poorly produced action scenes: As noted in one of the reviews here, "Hoppy lassos an outlaw's feet some twenty feet above him on a giant boulder" and threatens to pull the outlaw off unless he confesses.

Hoppy and sidekicks are locked in the local jail awaiting their hanging, but are "saved" by the heroine sneaking a gun into the food of their "last meal." However, the gun turned out to be unnecessary as Hoppy, in effect, simply overcame the "lawman" as Hoppy and crew were ushered out of the cell, something he could have done with or without the gun.

Finally, Hoppy sets a ridiculous trap to catch the 10 bad guy horsemen charging Hoppy and his sidekicks. Hoppy has some wagons, driven by some outlaws (but loaded with freed, armed Mexican laborers), charging the 10 outlaws who are riding towards the wagons. Hoppy and his sidekicks are riding behind the wagons. Well, the 10 outlaw horsemen ride past the wagons, but for some inexplicable reason, retreat when Hoppy and his few sidekicks fire on the 10 outlaws. So they, then, end up encircled by the wagons and give up! The 10 should have continued charging Hoppy and wiped him out.

A number of Hoppy films revolve around a mining background, they sure wanted to get their money's worth out of that particular mine setting! This time it's a crook who is using forced labour to run his mine.Hoppy tracks missing Mexican labourers to both the mine and town that is ruled by the elaborately named villain, Orestes Krebs.

Framed by Krebs as both judge, jury and executioner, Hoppy, California and Johnny are sentenced to hang. Initially suspected to be outlaws by the leading lady, Claudia Drake as Inez, (a common occurrence it seems for Hoppy and his companions), she does however see the light and helps the friends to clean up the whole crooked town.

A fairly lightweight entry in the series, with enough action and story to keep things bubbling to the end. Krebs makes a suitable evil schemer, who doesn't know when he's beaten and Hoppy gets plenty of opportunity to use his patented steely gaze at the proceedings.