The Eagle's Brood

The trio is only a duo in this second Hopalong Cassidy western The Eagle's Brood. Also Hoppy who is now a deputy sheriff resigns on a point of honor. Behavior expected of a cowboy hero.

Legendary Mexican bandit El Toro played by Franklyn Farnum is spotted on this side of the border. Farnum is on a mission, to find and rescue his grandson George Mori who was left alive after his parents are killed when they are robbed of gold he was shipping.

Farnum finds Hoppy all right, stuck in quicksand and sinking fast. Who could blame Hoppy for not following through on his apprehension after El Toro pulls him out. Instead he takes on El Toro's mission to find the little kid. The outlaws who killed the parents also want the kid to eliminate a witness.

As I said it's only a duo here, Bill Boyd and his young sidekick James Ellison. Gabby Hayes is here, minus his beard and sporting a handlebar mustache. He's bartender for head villain Addison Richard at Richard's saloon.

The Eagle's Brood proves if nothing else Hoppy is a man of honor.

This is the second of 66 Hopalong Cassidy films and captures the series and its stars at a formative moment. The result is perhaps the best film in the series, with only "Three Men From Texas" on the same footing. Five minutes into this film and it's obvious that it was not made for children. Some scenes are disturbing and there are no curbs on violence. Hoppy's world can be a nasty one and producer Harry Sherman was out to make realistic westerns, not sugar-coated Bs for kids. The film establishes a theme that ran through the entire series: Hoppy and his friends are really ranch hands; cowboys whose main job is driving cattle. But the stories typically pull them away from that and into adventures that have them helping total strangers simply because they need the help. Here it is the rescue of a young child who has been badly traumatized. The cast is excellent and is especially enhanced by James Ellison as young Johnny Nelson, Hoppy's juvenile sidekick, who is all too willing to fight and is thus often rash. Like sidekicks throughout the series, they often need a guiding hand from Hoppy to channel their instincts. Boyd, of course, is clearly forming his interpretation of the Cassidy character and he clearly puts to work his many years of film experience going back to the silents and classics like "King of Kings" and "The Volga Boatman." This is a first rate film that happens to be a western. It blurs the line between A and B pictures.

In case you are interested in seeing this film, it and most (if not all) of the Hopalong Cassidy B-westerns are available through YouTube. And, unlike many B-western heroes, these films are complete...not the chopped to pieces films which were cut down for TV time slots in the 1950s.

When the story begins, some bandits murder a couple...as their terrified son, Pedro, hides. The men have no idea that the kid can identify them....but later they learn and begin searching in earnest for the boy. At the same time, the boy's grandfather, a Mexican bandit known as 'El Toro', has learned what happened and he's left his hiding place in Mexico to cross the border to rescue the kid. But he's a wanted man...and lots of lawmen, include Hopalong, are looking for the retired bandit.

During his search for El Toro, Hoppy has an accident in the river...and he might drown. El Toro sees his predicament and saves him...and Hoppy is torn. He IS a lawman and has sworn to uphold the law...but he owes the man. And, when he learns why El Toro is there, Hoppy tells him to head back to Mexico...an HE promises to find the boy and return him to his grandfather. This means two things....resigning his job and posing as a baddie in order to infiltrate the gang who is looking for the boy.

This is among the very best of the Hopalong Cassidy films. And, since it's only the second one, it's a bit different. While George 'Gabby' Hayes is in the film, as he was in nearly all the early films in this series, like the early ones he plays a different character...not Windy. In this case, he sports a huge mustache instead of his usual grizzled beard.

Why did I like this one so much? Well, it's quite original and I enjoyed the violence. Now I am not a huge fan of violence, but too many of the B-westerns feature good guys who never kill anyone yet save the day...which is pretty unrealistic (Lone Ranger....take note!). In this one, one baddie gets drug to his death and the final one...well...it's memorable! This combined with good writing and acting make this one to see.

This is a superior B westerns from the early career of cowboy superstar William Boyd, AKA Hopalong Cassidy. "The Eagle's Brood" was released in 1935. By the early 1950's when I was growing up, Hoppy had become an institution. As a child I often wore a Hoppy hat, a Hoppy neckerchief with a steer's head as a clasp, black cowboy clothes, a Hoppy holster and toy guns (with steer heads on the handles), and a pair of Hoppy boots. For some odd reason, I had a Roy Rogers lunch box for school. Maybe Hoppy's merchandising agent unintentionally left that money maker off his list. Hoppy who was twenty years older by 1955 than he had been in his first Hopalong Cassidy films, still looked the same. How did he do that?

"The Eagle's Brood" has a fairly simple story. Yet it is so well-written and directed that it holds the viewer's attention all the way. This early entry came out before the era of the singing cowboys. So there's no music to slow down the action. By 1935 background music was being used to enhance the action. In the first talky westerns, no music was used because the movie moguls didn't think the audience would accept hearing an orchestra playing in the middle of a wild chase or fight. Yet a live orchestra (or a piano player) was used during the silent years to increase the impact of the action taking place on the screen.

This outing, Hoppy and his sidekick Johnny (Jimmy Ellison) are out to rescue a Mexican lad hid out by Delores, a friend of El Toro, the boy's grandfather, who just happens to be a notorious outlaw, played with gusto by silent film star William Farnum. The boy witnessed the murder of his parents. Thus the ringleader, Big Henry (Addison Richards), is out to silence the lad permanently if he and his gang can find the hideout. Delores is shot by Big Henry when she refuses to divulge the hiding place. Hoppy and Johnny step in leading to a wild shootout in the hills.

Gabby Hayes was still just plain George when he appeared in "The Eagle's Brood," playing sort of a good bad guy as a bar tending lackey to Big Henry. He goes by the moniker Spike. Fortunately he decided in later films to use the name Gabby. Somehow Spike Hayes just doesn't sound right.

The early Hoppy had a romantic streak. When he meets a soiled dove named Dolly, Delores' friend, he flirts with her using the line, "You're a cute little trick," and buys her not one but two drinks while he quenches his thirst with sarsaparilla.

We actually get a nice plot in this western theme film. As Hopalong has to fend off a gang of henchmen to save a boy from certain death by the local gang in a small western town.

The plot folds out as the boy's mother and father are killed and their gold stolen. The henchmen did not know that the boy was around and can quickly identify the men. So now the local gang is out to get the boy that has been hidden by a local bar dancer that actually works for the leader of the gang. She is going to try to get the boy back to his grandfather without the gang knowing. But her plan only ends in tragedy. But thanks to Hopalong and Johnny, things appear to be going in the correct direction to save the boy. That is till one of the main characters get shot.

There is nothing real remarkable about the performance and at times it felt the film was lacking action. But near the end, all things come together to make a nice show. Plus it was nice to see Gabby Hayes return to the cast since he was killed off in the last film. But he might just need a re-write to make it to film three.