Red River Valley

With the threat of drought always in their minds, the ranchers and farmers of the Red River Valley have set up a company to dam the river and provide needed water at all times. It's almost ready to open, but some one keeps delaying it by dynamiting the works. Who would want such a thing?

This Gene Autry movie is clearly a B picture under the direction of B. Reeves Eason, but it keeps moving along, even with four or five renditions of the title song and four others, mostly written by and performed by Autry and Smiley Burnette. There are a couple played by a jug band, but my favorite of them is "Fetch Me Down My Trusty '45", sung by Burnette. It moves at a good pace, thanks to editing by Joseph H. Lewis and Carl Pierson, but it doesn't impress me particularly, despite a fine sequence when the dam opens up and almost drowns a couple of fellows.

Wow, I love that torrential water rushing from the dam. Then too, director Eason shows why he was one of the best in the matinée business. He really knows how to stage action, whether jumping off sheer cliffs or fisticuffs atop a dam. I expect the concrete barrier was one of the many WPA public projects of the 30's, of which the TVA is the best known.

This is one of Gene's earliest and it's a doozy, really well produced by Republic with lots and lots of extras, locations in Yuma, AZ, and an unusual storyline. So who's trying to sabotage the dam and keep the farmers out. Gene and Frog work to find out, and you know they will since our hero is decked out in his best finery. But can Autry get the payroll money to the men in time—it's a nail-biter as Gene struggles across the barren flats. Music-wise, I couldn't get enough of the title song and ended up croaking it out til the wife left the room. And how about that jug band, just about everything but the proverbial kitchen sink. All in all, it's a great Autry mix that I expect helped put him on the matinée map.

A "9" on the matinée schedule.

This was an incisive indictment of American capitalist greed in a similar vein to Battleship Potemkin ... sorry, I've got my notes mixed up. This is much better than Potemkin! The print I watched needed some of the same TLC however, but I guess and reckon that won't happen.

Gene delivers his herd of steers to the railroad, only to change his job into that of the more exciting sounding "ditch rider" for the dam builders. I don't know, I suppose I could have missed it but what the heck is a ditch rider's duties, apart from thwarting the baddies at every turn? They're trying to stop construction on the dam, but not destroy it - a fine line in movies like this! The acting and screenplay is what you would expect; the title song is sung suitably downbeat throughout, with a little help from Smiley and a Novelty Hillbilly Band in the starkly lit saloon.

I loved it - not recommended for the serious.

When dynamite-wielding mystery men repeatedly sabotage the construction of a new reservoir and kill the "ditch rider" responsible for the site's security, cowboy Gene Autry is hired to replace him and bring the saboteurs to justice.

A typically entertaining Republic Pictures production, this has some good action and stunt work, with the always likable Smiley Burnette backing up Gene and offering some comic relief to the proceedings.

One interesting sequence (that should have been longer) involves Autry tracking the villains to an abandoned territorial prison in the middle of the desert.

Keen viewers will recognize future Producers' Releasing Corporation contract villain Charles King, who figures prominently in the film's climactic riot!

Musical interludes are few this time around, though Gene does get to sing his big hit version of the title song.

Champion runs, Gene sings. A mixture of modern day cowboys (with Damsand stuff) and old time cowboys. Plus some pretty decent non -Health & Safety action. Gene is a ditch rider and Champion knows he is really the Star ! Sabotage and dirty works at the irrigation plant, involving dynamite and songs along the way.

There is such an aura of dust bowl and emigration around this film. Jug blowing novelty acts, Woody Guthrie chord breaks in songs. When is a strike not a strike - when there's baddies and guns.

The usual shoot-em up finale and a few bars of Red River Valley.The film was marketed under the title Man of the Frontier, around the world, and that may be because of the clash with the other, more violent and more mediocre, film of the same name.

Champion runs, Gene Sings, nearly perfect in this movie.