Tesouro Maldito

One of the earlier chapters of the bower boy adventures. All three gorceys in this one.. leo, david, and dad. This time, the boys decide to take a trip out west, to find louie's lost gold. Suddenly, we're back in time, in the old west, trying to clear louie's name, from some misunderstanding. All the ingredients of a regular western... a marshall, a hanging, a secret map, pretty girls singing in the saloon. It's all pretty good. Fast moving script, at only 66 minutes. They even got iron eyes and chief yowlachie! It's all done tongue in cheek, with a sense of humor. Especially that ending. Directed by the usual director, bill beaudine. Co-stars julie gibson, minerva urecal.

Louie is accused of murder by horse riding sheriff Luke Barlow. The gang has to go west to clear Louie's name with a map on his back. They end up in the old west and get attacked by Indians led by Iron Eyes Cody.

It's a little much for the sheriff to ride a horse in New York City. The Bowery Boys do an old western. I get the idea but there are other ways to make them fish out of water. The funniest bit is the Indians being not as backwards as the Boys thought. They could do that for the whole western idea. Instead, the town is right out of the old west. I don't mind it but it's not as funny. Most franchises have a go-western episode. This one is not the best but it does have Iron Eyes Cody.

And darn proud of it! BOWERY BUCKAROOS actually gave Leo Gorcey's real-life dad, Bernard (as Louie), a sizeable role, which he always wanted in the first place. Here sweetshop owner Louie stands accused of murdering an old mining partner, forcing the Bowery Boys to head west to right a terrible wrong! How Louie wound up in the west is shear poetic license, as he was supposedly a born and bread citizen of the Bowery! Go Figure! Behind the scenes, according to Gorcey, his dad was forever threatening to quit the series because his role was not big enough, and keep in mind that his son was EXECUTIVE PRODUCER! There's also the rather interesting footnote, according to one of the supporting players, that Gorcey would snag funny lines from other actors! Apparently, he got a dressing down for what he did. Did it stop him? Not quite. According to director Edward Bernds, who directed several of the Bowery Boys films in the 1950s, Gorcey took the lead and, with the lead, most of the laughs, of course splitting the winnings with co-star Huntz Hall. He later concluded that Gorcey, in his own way, was quite clever and kept the series running strong on one-liners and comedy. Lots of cowboys and Indians in this one, courtesy of Monogram Pictures, which aside from the Bowery Boys, made a fortune off its western production unit. Special guest stars include veterans Iron Eyes Cody, Chief Yowlachie (as Chief High-Octane!), western heavies Black Jack O'Shea and Bud Osbourne. Nice supporting role by series regular Minerva Urecal as Kate Barlow, a sort of "mature" Miss Kitty from GUNSMOKE! This, unfortunately, was Bobby Jordan's final appearance in the series, after seven years, beginning with the East Side kids in 1940. Jordan's roles grew increasingly smaller, as he was just about hanging around, so he decided to strike out on his own. Some biographers claim it was a mistake as his roles in other films were also minor, and he may have been typecast as being one of the Bowery Boys in the first place. Gabe Dell, likewise, went solo a few years later, however, he made it a point to re-direction his career, attending acting classes and made a successful return to Broadway and then back to Hollywood. Best of the best. You ain't seen nothin' yet UNTIL you see and "hear" Louie sing "Louie the Lout!" You're darn tootin'! One of about eight Bowery Boys series entries in Warner Brothers dvd box sets, which have noticeably gone down in price over the years as they can be quite expensive.

While Huntz Hall (as Horace Debussy "Sach" Jones) reads "Hair Trigger Western Yarns", sweet shop proprietor Bernard Gorcey (as Louie) sings "Louie, the Lout" to Bobby Jordan (as Bobby), William "Billy" Benedict (as Whitey), and David Gorcey (as Chuck). Wrapped up in his western pulp stories, Mr. Hall daydreams about the days of "Cowboys & Indians", and "Louie" hints about a western past... Suddenly, a sheriff enters the scene, on horseback; he claims "Louie, the Lout' is a WANTED outlaw. Then, Bowery leader Leo Gorcey (as Slip Mahoney) arrives to find (his real-life father) the elder Gorcey hiding from the sheriff. Gorcey takes "The Bowery Boys" out west, to solve the case of the falsely accused "Louie".

The New York City group meet up with Cowboys and Native American Indians, in an old-fashioned western setting. Bowery chum Gabriel Dell (as Gabe) arrives in the town ("Hangman's Hollow"), undercover as "The Klondike Kid", to help the "Bowery Buckaroos" clear "Louie" and locate a gold mine. This is one of the cleverest movies in the "Bowery Boys" series. Gorcey delivers some of his best "malaprops" (a nude baby picture is "Exhibition A"); and the rest of the cast is uniformly smooth. The story is very nicely plotted, with Mr. Hall figuring prominently. "Marshall" Minerva Urecal and "Indian" Iron Eyes Cody are terrific. Regulars Bernard Gorcey and Gabriel Dell have good roles, too.

And, this is the last appearance of Bobby Jordan, who was in the originally named "Dead End" (1937) group. In the early 1940s, Mr. Jordan was featured much more prominently in these films - the stories were often about his character - but, as the comic antics of Gorcey and Hall took center stage, Jordan was derailed by both "Uncle Sam" and injury. In "Bowery Buckaroos", Jordan leads the secondary "Bowery Boys" in making the most out of their supporting roles. It's a shame the producers couldn't work Jordan into more stories, perhaps in spin-offs with Mr. Benedict's "Whitey" character (they have some good "bits" herein). In future films, Jordan will be missed.

******* Bowery Buckaroos (10/8/47) William Beaudine ~ Leo Gorcey, Huntz Hall, Bobby Jordan

Bowery Buckaroos (1947)

** (out of 4)

Eighth film in the Bowery Boys series has the boys heading out West where they must try and prove that Louie (Bernard Gorcey) was framed twenty-years earlier when some said he shot a man in the back. Once out West the boys must pretend (once again) to be someone they're not and get to the truth. Considering most comic duos or groups traveled out West at some point in their careers it should come as no shock that the Bowery Boys would eventually find themselves out there. For the most part this is yet another harmless entry in the series and there are some nice laughs but in the end there's no question that there's no enough to carry the short 66-minutes. I thought the film got off to a very good start with Bernard Gorcey really getting many laughs as he gets a tad bit more to do here than in some of the previous movies. Him telling about the "map" on his back was very funny as was his opening song. Speaking of songs, we get a later scene with the boys driving out West that is very funny as well. Once we get to the West things start off pretty good with a spoof of Indian attacks but after this things slow down rather quickly. I think the biggest problem is that the majority of the jokes simply aren't funny and instead of spoofing the genre the film just gives us one cliché after another. I think had the film kept the spoofing up then it could have gotten a lot more laughs than what's actually here. Leo and Huntz are their typical selves but we get some nice supporting performances by Minerva Urecal, Russell Simpson and Julie Gibson. This here also marked the last entry for Bobby Jordan, which was a shame considering how good he was but it's understandable that he left considering how he wasn't given much to do.