La vallée des fantômes

... as in too much saddle, not enough praddle in this short B modern dress western from RKO Pathe and director Fred Allen.

Tom Keene is a saddle tramp who encounters a man selling suits. The tramp tells the salesman that he'll buy him a meal at a restaurant if he lets him wear one of his suits into the restaurant. The reason is that he has his eyes set on a good-looking girl who just stepped into the restaurant and he wants to dress to impress.. But things go awry when the hungry haberdasher eats a princely sum of 2.75 worth of food when Tom Keene only has 1.50, and he is tossed into jail for non-payment.

Judge Drake, a crook representing the Long estate, tells the saddle tramp he'll get him out of jail and pay him a thousand dollars to pretend to be the long lost adopted son of the deceased - Jerry Long - who cannot be located. Gordon also wants "Jerry" to convince the other beneficiary, Jane Worth, a niece, to sell her interest in the ghost town she inherited to Gordon. The reason is that the mine in the ghost town, long thought to be played out, still has a rich vein of gold in it and the two crooks want to swindle Jane out of it.

However, the niece, Jane, turns out to be the attractive girl that "Jerry" was eyeing in the restaurant. And although Jerry knows nothing about the actual swindle, his mooning over Jane does distract him from convincing her to sell. I guess if Jane had been less attractive she would have been out of an inheritance. But I digress.

So the Judge and Gordon have hedged their bets on pressuring Jane to sell by making it appear that bandits are overrunning the town AND that the town is haunted. This sets up a chance for Jerry to shine in lots of riding and shooting action, while making Jane think he is some kind of bumbling dandy who doesn't know one end of a horse from another so that the judge and Gordon won't suspect him of helping her.

There's just entirely too much riding in this film with not enough story, even at under an hour. Plus, not until the end is it explained why the crooks want to buy this ghost town, although the presence of an old mine does imply the motivation. In its defense, when the actors are given an opportunity to act they do well.

There's not too much to this little movie, but it is a decent time passer.

Interesting but not very technically sophisticated haunted house-comedy-western set in what appears to be a genuine abandoned town in the American West. Some great riding by hero Tom Keene, good action shots involving an ore cart swung over a canyon. The scenes shot in the ghost town are rather revealing as is the mix between traditional cowboys and modern (1932) automobiles. Probably the most surprising linkage in this movie is when Tom Keene uses a cap to hide his identity when trying to foil to bad guys. I knew that I had seen the technique before -- quite frankly I think it would be a bit absurd to try to walk around or ride a horse with your left hand holding a black cape in front of your face. Then I remembered "Plan Nine From Outer Space" and Bela Lugosi's double doing just that. Would you believe that "Plan Nine" was Tom Keene's last movie! Maybe he shared that technique with Lugosi's double who finished Lugosi's role using the exact same technique. Look for Gabby Hayes (sans bead and with teeth) as the cafe owner. Not a bad story, good action, would have been better probably if made a few years later with better equipment. Recommended.

It's not quite a ghost town thatTom Keene and Merna Kennedy are due to inherit, but it isn't doing well since the gold mine petered out. Mitchell Harris discovers a rich vein, and wants to get Miss Kennedy's share, so he hires the galoot who rides into town, who turns out to be Tom Keene, to pretend to be Tom Keene. Between Keene's urging, threats of a gang that want to take over and some actual cash, Harris expects to become rich.

It's another of the underrated RKO B Westerns. TCM has been showing these recently in beautiful prints that lets the audience see Ted McCord's beautiful lighting, and there's lots of good humor in the script that director Fred Allen brings out. Tom Keene may never have escaped the westerns -- despite his appearance in the odd Ed Wood movie -- but he was a serious actor and could play the galoot as well as anyone shy of Gary Cooper.

Horror-westerns are relatively rare, so it nice to see this one. I'm not a particular fan of Keene and his RKO product; frankly, these films don't have the raw quality of the Monograms and other poverty row studios. But I liked the use of a real abandoned town and mine, more realistic than the usual sets. And I particularly liked the extensive use of the Bronson Canyon cave. as the mine interior. See Wikipedia for a list of the films shot there. I learned to love it as the entrance to the underground city of Murania in The Phantom Empire. I eventually had a chance to visit and walk through it. Quite a thrill. Another well used spot is the entrance to the Tibetan valley in The Werewolf of London. I believe it still exists, even though the Iverson Ranch was turned into tract homes many years ago. So, if you're a fan of interesting locations, this film is worth the watch.