A Vila dos Fantasmas

As the roving range detective, battling rustlers with a ghost town hideout, Buck Jones is ideally cast in the first of his four serials for Universal. Madge Bellamy is the feisty heroine and former silent serial stars, William Desmond and Walter Miller, provide excellent support as the crusty rancher and his sneaky foreman. Just about every chapter has Buck and Silver being chased by the bad guys or chasing after them and the plot is enlivened by the ghost town being inhabited by a mystery man. The best line in the movie must be when Buck is trussing up a rustler and says, "I'd rock you to sleep if I could find a rock!" If you like Buck Jones or Western serials, both are combined here to good effect.

GORDON OF GHOST CITY was Buck Jones first serial with Universal and a pretty darn good one. There aren't a lot of spooks here, to be perfectly honest, but there's a deserted town that has a ton of gold hidden beneath it and it all belongs to the lovely Madge Bellamy. Naturally the baddies want it and Buck has to get them before they get him. There's the usual crash and chase scenes, in this case through deserted, old buildings and hidden tunnels, but what makes this serial so good is the rapport between Jones and Bellamy. They made an excellent team and, quite frankly a handsome couple, and its too bad they weren't in a few more productions together. Bellamy, a very good actress, plays well opposite Jones as they take on an assortment of devious characters, fun to watch. Also featured is Jones wonder horse, Silver, a talented animal in his own right, who has a few neat action scenes thrown in for good measure. Great to see this one on dvd and thanks to Universal, which had fairly high photographic and production standards, the available copies are quite good. Worth a look for old times sake and a salute to the great Buck Jones.