Undercover Man

Yet another good b Western from William Boyd and the team – but Hoppy and California have a new partner for the next half a dozen movies in Breezy – a proto-Audie Murphy in 1942.

A gang of mysterious raiders is robbing and looting on both sides of the US-Mexican border, seemingly getting plenty of information of where the next rich pickings will be. Hopalong & Co. come along to stop awhile at the Gonzalez hacienda, their mission to stop the hold ups and find out who's leaking the information to the baddies in the first place. Breezy's brief fling with Gonzalez's daughter is flung out of the script early while California supplies the comedy by proving yet again he has an enormous appetite, his love-life depending on it though! There's some nice countryside to be seen even when full of horses and men, and the general production was good for the type of film. The WW2 Good Neighbour policy was heavily pushed, but surely better than todays To Hell With The Neighbours policy? Favourite bits: Hoppy and Gonzalez (I wonder if one of them won the chess match) and their coteries chasing one another confusedly each thinking the other was the guilty party; following Bob to the bandits nest on a lovely evening.

It's my kind of undemanding low to middlebrow fun - one I can watch till the cows come home.

Undercover Man has Hopalong Cassidy along with Jay Kirby and Andy Clyde acting as agents to discover just who is behind a series of raids on both sides of the border. It has the Texas Rangers and the Mexican Federales stumped.

As usual Andy Clyde provides the comedy, but he has a rival here in Chris-Pin Martin who was Gordito in Cesar Romero's Cisco the Kid films. Both are rivals for a large widow woman who has a bunch of kids.

The outlaws seem to know everything that's going on in advance and worst of all the Texas and Mexican authorities believe that it's Hoppy who is leader of the outlaw band and Antonio Moreno a large landowner and head of the Federales who is the leader of the gang in Texas. Neat little trick which kind of slows down cooperation for a while.

The answer is in some old wanted posters where Hoppy finds who the real culprit is. Incidentally his crimes extend to blackmail.

Seeing this film now with all the border problems that have recently been in the news makes me wonder about if it is still possible to get that kind of cooperation that made this joint border operation possible in this film.

A bandit who robs both Americans and Mexicans is causing each side of the border to blame the other. Hoppy has to settle matters, but he's soon suspected of being the leader of the bandits, and Hoppy suspects a respected rancher of the same, which adds the mystery to this good, snappy entry that has plenty of night time shoot em up and noirish tone in its black and white. Comedy from Andy Clyde can drown out the mystery elements, but it would've been a much shorter film if it had been trimmed. There's a nice message of being nice to your neighbours and the Mexicans are treated favourably rather than the usual bad hombres.

In the 1950s, lots of old B-westerns from the 30s and 40s were chopped to pieces in order to get these films to fit into an hour-long time slot. Fortunately, in the case of Hopalong Cassidy's films, he had the foresight to save the originals....and recently these beautiful original-length movies have been downloaded to YouTube. The abbreviated films ran about 54 minutes....but this copy I saw on YouTube runs 65.

When the story begins, officials on both sides of the US-Mexican border are lamenting how various gangs go back and forth over the border to avoid arrest. One of them gets an idea....to find a civilian who will go into Mexico to investigate. Naturally, it's Hopalong Cassidy and soon he and his current partners, California (Andy Clyde) and Breezy (Jay Kirby) , tag along to help. However, soon Hoppy starts getting reports that his trusted new friend, Mr. Gonzales was seen with the gang....and Gonzales starts getting reports that Hoppy was seen with the gang. What' really going on here?!

The Mexicans were prominently featured in this film and that isn't surprising. At the time, the US government was pushing the 'good neighbor policy' in order to strengthen US relations with Central and South America in order to prevent them from coming under Axis influence. And, as such, the Mexican folks in this one are portrayed more realistically and positively. Not a bad thing at all...and something I have seen in other Hopalong Cassidy films of the era.

So is it any good? Yes...but it's not especially great either. More an enjoyable time-passer than anything else. Dependable and enjoyable but nothing more.

Set on the Mexican border, in Sonora, 1887. This is a good Hoppy movie with some interesting differences. Breezy (the young romantic substitute for "Johnny" or "Lucky") makes only a half-hearted attempt at romance, & then gives up easily. Most of the "romance" is actually provided by California, who's interested in Rosita for her cooking skills. It's refreshing to see real Latin actors portraying the Mexicans in this film, & there's much Spanish dialog, as would be expected. The film gets a little preachy a couple of times, encouraging "understanding on both sides of the border." There are several exciting night chase scenes, & a great silhouette shot of Hoppy on Topper. The funniest moment comes when California is vying with Chris-Pin Martin for the affections/food of Rosita, & California, to get the upper hand, kisses all of her children! Hoppy faithful Earle Hodgins has a very small part as a Sheriff. Hoppy is dressed all in black for most of the movie, but at one point looks ridiculous wearing a smoking jacket with his cowboy pants & knee high cowboy boots! Good mystery & good all around entertainment. I rate it 7/10.