Tex Rides with the Boy Scouts

I'm sure formally this film is classified as a B movie. I also think the DVD copy I watched added to the crappy technical aspects-both because of a bad transfer and damage to the print they used wasn't fixed at all. But this film is so corny, so badly put together, so cheap looking and has such odd elements included-i.e. The 5 minutes of Scouting documentary, a really dark story beat in the climax involving a kid-that it plays out like a Western version of say Robot Monster and other psychotronic disasters. The film has hints of the sublime awfulness that unintentional camp is made from.

Unfortunately, or fortunately depending on your perspective, the acting is just competent enough that this is a just a bad film; it's entertaining enough in its schlocky aspects. Ritter has enough natural charm to make his character worth rooting for and alas prevent the sublime awfulness to fully flower in the film.

So I enjoyed it but it is lands in a middling spot where it is neither good nor bad enough to love.

The film begins with stock footage of a National Scout Jamboree in Washington, D.C. as both a lengthy introduction to and promotion of the "Worldwide Boy Scout Movement" and the film's dedication.

Tex Collins (Tex Ritter) and his two side kicks Pee-Wee (Snub Pollard) and Stubby (Horace Murphy) are really agents from the Department of Justice on the trail of a million dollar gold heist from a train. There are clues throughout the film to help you guess their lawman identity-- it's not a 'surprise' at the end as it was in so many other early westerns of the decade.

The film has a large cast, and tries to integrate a Boy Scout troupe into the key action, but that attempt is a weak part of the film. In fact, not much is really distinctive in it. Despite the presence of Charles King (who has the best lines) and underused Forrest Taylor as the villains, and the glorious Texas accent of Tex, they all don't get enough screen time. Marjorie Reynolds, who was famous as Riley's wife Peg on the TV 'Life of Riley' (1953-1958) has only a couple of scenes with Tex as the 'love interest,' but their relationship never really gets anywhere.

The side kicks antics are not funny and time consuming. The best part of the movie is Tex singing "The Girl I Left Behind Me" with the 'Beverly Hill Billies' at a barn dance. Other than that, this one is not worth much. Tex's first film, 'Song of the Gringo' (1936), with a smaller cast and more character development, is better.

SPOILER WARNING: No such scene as described in the title appears in this movie (probably just as well considering the speculation it might have prompted!); which sums up the casual attitude the whole film takes to sustaining a plausible narrative.

A fresh-faced young Tex Ritter improbably claims to be a geologist while going undercover to track down dapper gang boss Forrest Stanley, who shocks even his henchman when he shoots a boy scout in the back, but otherwise does a pretty sloppy job as an arch-villain. Tex likewise carelessly drops a vital letter in the street enabling Stanley to pick it up and examine it.

Considering the zero budget this film must have had, it doesn't stint on frequent elegant optical wipes of the sort that I wish modern filmmakers would rediscover.

Tex Ritter is on the trail of a gang of outlaws who've been robbing mines in the area of a Boy Scout camp. When Tex and his two sidekicks. Horace Murphy and Snub Pollard, ride in they're in like flynn. Especially after Tex shows his beaver badge to young Tommy Bupp because back in the day Ritter was a Boy Scout. As every clean living cowboy hero was or ought to have been.

Things don't go as smooth for Tex with Tommy's sister Marjorie Reynolds, but with Tommy putting in a good word for him, it all works out in the end.

This film was done for short lived Grand National Studios and while it lasted Tex was their B picture western star. Ritter had a nice pleasant singing voice, too bad he wasn't at Republic like Roy and Gene were.

The film really was a big commercial for the Boy Scouts and I'll bet recruiting went up after Tex Ritter made use of the Scouts in nailing the bad guys. They were sure more help than his two dimwit sidekicks.

I loved it. Not as much as some other Tex Ritter movies, but because it had Tex Ritter in it with his singing, I loved it. (I do wish we had some of those times back, such as wanting to emulate the good character of the scouts again. Couldn't hurt society.) I miss those character building movies, when good was good and evil was definitely evil. The singing was better in some of the other Ritter movies, but his singing here was better than most other actors and singers in western movies. So I guess it boils down to this rule of thumb, if Ritter is in a movie and he is singing in that movie, you sure can't go wrong by watching it! I agree that his sidekicks were not up to par either.