The Escape of Broncho Billy

Broncho Billy Anderson and Rodney Hildebrand are rivals for the hand of Ruth Savile. When Ruth's father, Lee Willard, collapses and dies while digging fence posts, Hildebrand discovers the corpse and frames Billy for the man's murder in this remake of 1912's A STORY OF MONTANA.

It's late days for Broncho Billy Anderson as the movies' first cowboy superstar, although he would continue on as co-owner of Essanay movies, and show up with a late nostalgic turn more than fifty years later in THE BOUNTY KILLERS. Still, his career as an actor would dribble out within a couple of more years as better stories with better actors like William S. Hart would supersede his rough short films.

Even so, this is a typically interesting short subject, with some interesting people in small roles, like Lloyd Bacon, one of Warner's workhorse directors in the 1930s as the sheriff, and Ben Turpin, best remembered as the cross-eyed comic for Mack Sennett, as a man hanging around outside the saloon. Both of these men would work with Chaplin and have long and prosperous careers. They had gotten their starts with Anderson.