Driftin' River

In this entertaining matinée entry from singin' cowboy Eddie Dean, cattle rustlers are foiled by the undercover work of government agent Dean . Rubbery-faced sidekick Soapy Ates helps the hero subdue the rascally cattle-snatchers.

The script and budget were limited here, but Dean had one of the better singing voices in western film and as always took the role seriously. Kindly-faced William Fawcett appears again as the bad-guy, with very believable results.

This film was fairly standard and routine, but offers action and good tunes to the B-western fan.

Eddie Dean and a non-stuttering Roscoe Ates are horse traders. They head over to Shirley Patterson's ranch to buy horses, but the animals are rustled and the army won't do anything. Eddie Dean is mistaken for outlaw Wylie Grant and tries to take advantage of the error to investigate.

Handsome camerawork by Marcel Le Picard can't overcome a script co-written by director Robert Emmett Tansey, whose rule was that when the oater took more than an hour, to cut the plot. Dean is surprisingly good given this handicap, but he sings well, rides a horse well, and says the dopy lines with some conviction.

Driftin' River finds Eddie Dean and a non-stuttering Roscoe Ates working for the army investigating the theft of horses intended for the army by a gang.

This unfortunately is where the plot gets unbelievable. Horse thieving is one thing, but what this gang does is massacre an army patrol after delivery is made to make up for an error when a shipment does get through. They don't even attempt an effort to disguise their work so Indians might get blamed. That's just begging for trouble, no outlaw with half a brain would do that.

In his investigation Dean gets a lucky break when with some idling whistling he gets mistaken for an outlaw named Whistling Sam Wade and gains entry into the gang. Of course the inevitable results follow.

Producer's Releasing Corporation gave us this one and while fans of B westerns might like it, the rest will pass this one by.