The Arizona Raiders

"The Arizona Raiders" (1936) is what I call an "uneven film". They took a pretty good Zane Grey story and then assembled an excellent ensemble of actors; but Paramount Pictures tried to bring the thing in on a shoestring. Even by the low budget standards of the one-hour "B" westerns of its day this one stands out as a cheap production. Lots of lame stock footage poorly matched with studio close-ups and coupled with clumsily staged action sequences made even weaker by having key portions of the action happening off screen.

Fortunately there are enough good performances that overall the film ranks pretty high on the pecking order of these Saturday matinée features. Larry "Buster" Crabbe of Olympic swimming and "Flash Gordon" fame plays the standard wondering cowpoke western hero. Like a lot of famous non-actors who got work in the movies he pretty much plays himself in every part, but he has a nice relaxed screen presence that fits this particular character especially well. Character actor and Johnny Mack Brown sidekick Raymond Hatton provides a lot of comic relief as Buster's sidekick (what a surprise) who is a weird combination of Doc Holiday and Uncle Joe from "Petticoat Junction". And Johnny Downs nicely underplays one of his earnest young men characters; named Alonzo "Lonesome" Mulhall.

The prize of the cast is a very young Marsha Hunt in one of her first roles. Hunt was the Janet Leigh of her era; there is quite a physical resemblance in addition to which both actresses were a little too intelligent looking for the movie business. Which did have the advantage of giving almost all the characters they played a subtle kind of dimensionality. The film would have benefited from a few more shots of Marsha (especially some better close-ups) but she is in enough scenes and there is enough excellent acting demonstrated to make the film mandatory viewing for her fans.

The three male stars are essentially a mismatched version of the "Three Mesquiteers" who assist the female owner of the Spanish Peaks Ranch to foil a plot to steal her herd of horses. The film gets unintentionally hilarious in its climatic stampede scene as the stock footage background projection transforms a modest size herd into enough horses to outfit several dozen regiments of cavalry.

The Lions Gate DVD is not an especially good print but its Special Features are a real treasure. These include two documentary style films made by Zane Grey and a third documentary about the author himself who was a very interesting character.

Then again, what do I know? I'm only a child.

The Arizona Raiders finds Buster Crabbe and Raymond Hatton as a pair of western characters no better than they ought to be. In fact Hatton is wanted in all kinds of places for various non-violent offenses. But in their travels they also come upon young Johnny Downs who has tried to elope with his sweetheart Betty Jane Rhodes. Downs has pursued Rhodes and her older sister Marsha Hunt from Kentucky where they've come to take possession of a horse ranch that belonged to their late father, but is now run by lawyer and estate executor Grant Withers.

Years ago my mother was given sound advice concerning my father's estate which was never to have the executor be a lawyer, too many opportunities to milk the estate. Which is what should have happened here because Grant the Snidely Whiplash like shyster has been dipping in the till. And he plans to steal the ranch herd from Hunt and Rhodes with the connivance of foreman Don Rowan.

So in this film adapted from a Zane Grey novel it's up to these three unlikely heroes to stop the villainy and put things right. Do we have to ask whether that's done in this B western?

Like his fellow swimming Tarzan Johnny Weissmuller, Buster Crabbe had gotten used to the camera and was handling a great deal more dialog and variety of parts than Weissmuller was. Crabbe avoided the jungle trap of Tarzan that Weissmuller couldn't. He's a more than credible cowboy hero for B westerns, in fact later on he essayed a few villain parts.

Raymond Hatton is very funny in his role and he's matched by Richard Carle as the Justice of the Peace who winds up throwing Johnny Downs in jail on Withers complaint after the elopement fails. But one of the best bits I've seen in a B western comes when Crabbe breaks Downs and Hatton out of jail by use of some firecrackers to stampede a herd of cattle going through town. The cattle in the stampede destroy the rickety jail and the three companions are united.

Definitely this was one film the juvenile audience on Saturday afternoon would thoroughly have enjoyed along with their parents.

An unflappable Buster Crabbe seemed to have fun in this movie. With sidekick Raymond Hatton playing the notorious Tracks Williams, the comic relief was off the charts. The much performed 'My Melancholy Baby' sung here by 14 year old Betty Jane Rhodes was this best version ever. When Grant Withers told the Justice of the Peace (Richard Carle) to have 'Our Gang' alum Johnny Downs arrested for eloping with a minor, he wasn't kidding. The roguery commences when Buster saves himself then Hatton from a neck-tie party. The real party begins there with a very entertaining western.