Border Patrol

Hoppy, California, & Johnny are all Texas Rangers (I guess they had very loose hiring criteria if California got in!). Hoppy's dressed in all black throughout the film (this is important to those of us who know that his black outfit signifies "he means business" & his rancher's & other outfits signify "he's only fooling around & trying to act like someone other than "Hoppy"). The setting is Silver Bullet, Texas, & no, The Lone Ranger is not in this movie, although practically everyone else is! George Reeves (Superman) is here; he plays a Mexican & is on screen for only a few moments. Duncan Renaldo (The Cisco Kid) is here, & has a nice role as a Mexican police commandant. Robert Mitchum plays his usual (for his early days in the westerns) baddie. Claudia Drake actually has a more significant role in the film than anyone other than Hoppy himself. There's good action (4 gunfights), good humorous situations, & overall it's quite nicely done, with good production values. I rate it 8/10.

Border Patrol finds Hopalong Cassidy together with sidekicks Andy Clyde and Jay Kirby serving as Texas Rangers guarding the Mexican. A dead Mexican national and Claudia Drake's idea that they shot the man riding the horse that the dead man was riding that she claims belonged to her sweetheart George Reeves. Even after presenting their Ranger credentials to the Mexican border cop Duncan Renaldo doesn't convince her.

But back they go across the border to an outlaw town where it's rumored a lot of Mexican laborers have gone to work. What they find is a town run by Judge Russell Simpson who makes Roy Bean look like Oliver Wendell Holmes. Fortunately for their sakes Claudia Drake has a change of mind about Hoppy and his sidekicks because Simpson doesn't recognize their status as Texas Rangers, his is the only law where he has jurisdiction.

This Hopalong Cassidy film is notable for two things, it is one of the films that featured Robert Mitchum down in the cast as one of Simpson's hired guns. The second is the performance of Russell Simpson who even as he's deadly serious about hanging Hoppy and the sidekicks still laces his 'rulings' and 'jurisprudence' with a little humor.

Definitely a must for Hopalong Cassidy and Robert Mitchum fans.

After witnessing the murder of a Mexican national, border patrolman Hopalong Cassidy and pals are promptly abducted and taken to Mexico by a feisty senorita who believes them responsible. Set free by the federales, they investigate the disappearances of dozens of migrant workers seeking jobs in a silver mine and end up stepping into a madman's own private town.

A William Boyd/Hopalong Cassidy vehicle that comes real close to going over the top, there's a lot of fun and great stars here, with head villain Russell Simpson giving a spirited, amusing performance alongside henchman Robert Mitchum (billed here as Bob in a very early role!), as well as future Superman George Reeves and the Cisco Kid, Duncan Renaldo!

As offbeat as you're likely to get in a "Hoppy" movie, action and humor mix effortlessly, leading to a rousing climax, well directed by genre veteran Lesley Selander, who helmed low-budget westerns for major studios well into the 1960's, some of which are considered minor classics.

When the story begins, Hoppy and his partners come upon a dying man. Soon, he dies and Inez sees this and automatically assumes the trio killed him. Like the angry stereotypical women I've seen in a few of the Hopalong Cassidy films, her anger makes no sense...and she never gives them a chance to explain. She then, at gunpoint, forces them to go with her into Mexico. There, she turns them over to Mexican authorities...only to be told that she just kidnapped three Texas Rangers! And, like the angry stereotypical women trope, she STILL thinks the three are murderers!

One reason Inez is so angry is because her boyfriend went to work at a mine in the States...and he simply disappeared. The same has happened to other Mexicans....and Hoppy, California and Johnny all agree to go to the Silver Bullet Mine to look for clues. But, when they approach the mine, they are attacked and soon are before a kangaroo court bent on hanging them. Why? What's going on here?! And is there any chance for Inez to grow up and let go of her weird vendetta?!

This is a good but flawed installment. Flawed because Inez's character simply makes no sense at times. The rest of the story, however, is interesting and involves slavery...an unusual topic for a B-western. Worth seeing.

This Hoppy film seems to have more IMDb "user reviews" than any other Hoppy movie I have seen. No sense repeating the info in those seven reviews. I'd like to add these comments: The story is very simple and straight-forward. For the first 30 minutes it moves very slowly; in fact nothing much happens except that Hoppy is sent off by the Mexican authorities to find out what happened to missing Mexican laborers sent to work in a particular US town. Once at the town, Hoppy and sidekicks are "arrested," find out the misdeeds of the local crime boss, escape, and round up the bad guys.

I noticed three particularly poorly produced action scenes: As noted in one of the reviews here, "Hoppy lassos an outlaw's feet some twenty feet above him on a giant boulder" and threatens to pull the outlaw off unless he confesses.

Hoppy and sidekicks are locked in the local jail awaiting their hanging, but are "saved" by the heroine sneaking a gun into the food of their "last meal." However, the gun turned out to be unnecessary as Hoppy, in effect, simply overcame the "lawman" as Hoppy and crew were ushered out of the cell, something he could have done with or without the gun.

Finally, Hoppy sets a ridiculous trap to catch the 10 bad guy horsemen charging Hoppy and his sidekicks. Hoppy has some wagons, driven by some outlaws (but loaded with freed, armed Mexican laborers), charging the 10 outlaws who are riding towards the wagons. Hoppy and his sidekicks are riding behind the wagons. Well, the 10 outlaw horsemen ride past the wagons, but for some inexplicable reason, retreat when Hoppy and his few sidekicks fire on the 10 outlaws. So they, then, end up encircled by the wagons and give up! The 10 should have continued charging Hoppy and wiped him out.