Starlight Over Texas

Starlight Over Texas is another Tex Ritter western from the Monogram Studios and in this Tex is a Texas Ranger sent to ferret out who is behind a lot of villainy on both sides of the border. Rumor has it that it is Yaqui Indians from Mexico doing the dirty work, but that turns out not to be the case.

In fact perennial western villain Karl Hackett is a particularly nasty piece of work. He captures and kills a US Marshal and assumes his identity, the better to keep tabs on the Rangers.

Tex has two comic sidekicks Horace Murphy and Snub Pollard who if you can believe this are working undercover though when we first meet them they're in a Mexican jail. Can't say for sure what effect they were over there, but later on one of the villains lets them go because he doesn't believe they've stumbled on to anything or are too stupid to realize it. Maybe there is something to the philosophy that idiots make the best undercover agents, but I doubt it.

Starlight Over Texas has a lot of musical numbers both of a country/western and a Latin flavor in fact for a while this looked to be more musical than western. But the front row kids get enough action to suit them in the end.

Although the comic relief of Murphy and Pollard was a little over the top in this film, Starlight Over Texas is not a bad product considering its poverty row origins from Monogram.