Three Texas Steers

Three Texas Steers (1939)

*** (out of 4)

Fast paced Three Mesquiteers film has the gang trying to rescue a circus owner who's being harassed for her property. The story itself really isn't anything new or groundbreaking but if you've ever wanted to see John Wayne act next to a midget and gorilla then this is the film for you. The film never takes itself too serious and plays everything for laughs, which is a good thing because how can you take Wayne and a midget serious? There are a couple good chase scenes as well as a nice fight to go along with all the circus stuff. Roy Corrigan, one of the Mesquiteers, also worked as the gorilla!!!

After the success of 'Stagecoach', as well as seeing his wife give birth to their second child, Patrick Wayne, the previous year, the 32 year old John Wayne continued to act in westerns and immortalize the American West.

One of 51 Republic westerns, in the late '30s and early '40s, under the banner of The Three Mesquiteers: a combination of mesquite and musketeers. The identity of the 3 actors varied. John Wayne was in only 8, including this one. With a run time of only 55 min., it packs in a lot of scheming and action. It's an early example of the directing of B movies by George Sherman. He would eventually move to Columbia, then to Universal, always directing almost exclusively B westerns. Here, Wayne is Stony, Ray Corrigan is Tucson, and Max Trehune is Lullaby. The latter occasionally gets out his dummy: Elmer, to practice his ventriloquism....... Nancy(Carole Landis) is running a circus. Her financial manager, George Ward(Ralph Graves)receives a(planted) letter offering to buy her inherited ranch for $2000. George recommends she sell it, but she balks, saying some year she wants to retire to that ranch. Besides, she doesn't need the money, as her circus brings in enough income. George, who is the inside man for a ring of villains, tells Steve about his disappointment. They decide to stage a number of dramatic 'accidents' to make the people afraid to come to the circus. Thus, the lion cage is unlatched, resulting in pandemonium. Then, a tent is set on fire. Soon, lawsuits also eat into the profits, and the circus has to fold. George again recommends that she sell her ranch, but she's determined to move there........It happened that the 3Ms had a ranch (the 3M) adjacent to Nancy's ranch, called the WE. It also happened that the sign for the 3M ranch had been knocked upside down, so that it read WE. So, when Nancy was looking for her ranch, she and a few circus people moved into the 3M ranch house, before the 3Ms returned. She was so enthusiastic about the house, the 3Ms were afraid to tell her it was the wrong house, her real house being not nearly so nice. Thus, initially, they pretended that the WE ranch was theirs. George soon arranged to set the WE barn on fire, hoping to scare Nancy into selling.......Nancy gets a letter from the government offering to buy her ranch for $75,000., as they want to build a dam there.(George had previously gotten a similar letter, hence why he was so set on buying the ranch for a pittance). This would be enough to start up another circus. However, the actions of the 3Ms have made this transaction problematic. See the movie (available at YouTube) to find out the problem and what the 3Ms did to solve it.......Nancy's circus remnant included Collette Lyons, as Lillian, and Willie: the Gorilla, who provide occasional humor. Lillian is the stereotypical sexy blond bimbo. When she got to the ranch, she asked how long it would take to learn to milk a chicken? Willie, of course, was Ray Corrigan, in a gorilla suit. Every now and then he would scare somebody or get into mischief........This was still early in the film career of Carole Landis, who wasn't in many westerns. Less than a decade later, she would take an overdose of sleeping pills. She was depressed about her revolving door romantic life. Also, her movie career seemed to be stalled. In addition, she had a number of health issues, including some residual problems acquired in the South Pacific when she was entertaining GIs during the war. Finally, she was disappointed by her endometriosis negating the possibility ofhavingchildren

This film essentially begins with a young circus owner named "Nancy Evans" (Carole Landis) refusing to sell some land she just inherited to her trusted business manager "George Ward" (Ralph Graves) for personal reasons unrelated to the business at hand. To that effect, in his desperation to own that land, George begins a campaign of sabotage aimed at forcing her sell it in order to save her circus. And when that fails, he then hires men to go after her as well. What he doesn't count on, however, is the involvement of the Three Mesquiteers who happen to own land adjacent to her run-down ranch and are more than willing to help her out any they can. Now, rather than reveal any more, I will just say that I don't consider this to be one of the better Three Mesquiteers films ever produced due in large part to the heavy focus on "Lullaby Joslin" (Max Terhune) who is typically there in a supporting role to provide comic relief. That being said, rather than featuring a prominent actor like John Wayne (as "Stony Brooke) or even Ray Corrigan ("Tucson Smith") for that matter, the director (George Sherman) chose to showcase the weakest of the Three Mesquiteers instead. And that would have been fine if Max Terhune was actually funny. But he wasn't--and this had a negative impact on the movie as a whole. At least, that is how it seemed to me. In any case, I didn't particularly care for this specific addition to the series, and I have rated it accordingly. Below average.

Besides of course John Wayne, two other movie legends got parts in the B western series The Three Mesquiteers. One was Jennifer Jones and the second in this film was Carole Landis. After a whole bunch of bit roles, Carole got the female lead here in Three Texas Steers. Right after that she got signed for her breakthrough role in One Million, BC with a 20th Century Fox contract to boot.

Here Carole is the owner of a circus who all of a sudden runs into a streak of horrible bad luck. Due to a lot of accidents her circus has to fold and she retreats to her ranch. It's a pretty broken down place, but fortunately the one piece of good luck she has is the fact that The Three Mesquiteers own the neighboring ranch.

The boys are a bit oafish in this one and Max Terhune manages to get himself swindled which nearly puts them all down the toilet, both the Mesquiteers and the Landis spread. Of course things work out all right in the end as Carole finds out who's behind her bad luck and why her ranch is so valuable.

Carole Landis had a lot of beauty and a lot of talent in one package. It's interesting to see her at this point in her career, before she went totally platinum blond. Too bad she and the Duke never got to work together again when both were A list stars.