Navajo Kid

When the local Indian agent is murdered, his foster son, Bob Steele, aka The Navajo Kid goes looking for the killer.

Like the other B Westerns that Steele did for PRC, it's a dull affair with Steele giving his all. He gets on his horse in strange manners, he explodes into action during fights, and his line reading is interesting, but director Harry Fraser has no idea of how to fill up the movie (which he also wrote), forcing cameraman Jack Greenhalgh to longer takes and editor Roy Livingston to slower cuts. He's got Syd Saylor for comic relief, but doesn't use him. He's got Caren Marsh for romantic interest, but doesn't use her.

Of course PRC was the dead end of Poverty Row and their budget for this movie was probably measured in the hundreds of dollars. Which is an excuse more than an explanation.

This is an enjoyable oater that borrows Mark Twain's short story about a bull frog full of buckshot as a sub-plot.

Bob Steele is in top form and shows off his athletic build in a shirtless wrestling match at the beginning of the movie.

If you like B Westerns, this one is enjoyable, standard fare as Steele (the Navajo Kid) looks for the varmints that robbed and murdered his paw and finds romance along the way.

He may be small (5'5"), but Bob Steele is a human dynamo. Catch his acrobatics mounting a horse or his many adroit brawling moves. Then too, that hard-eyed stare is as good as Eastwood's. No doubt about it, he's a high-energy performer, never boring. Here, he's a white man who's learned Indian ways that he's using to track down his real father after baddies killed his adoptive dad. If that sounds complicated—yeah, I had trouble too. But it doesn't matter. There's some hard riding, a good surprising brawl, and even Saylor's comic relief works pretty well.

One reason to watch is a chance to see two classic Western bad guys in action. I. Stanford Jolley is the long-faced cardsharp, familiar from a hundred of these oaters. He's got a lot of lines and screen time here, but goes uncredited in the cast credits. You wonder why. Then there's rotund Charles King, taking time off from his usual gang boss, as a gang henchman with few lines and not much screen time. So why is he credited, but not Jolley! But pity poor Caren Marsh who doesn't show up until the movie's almost over.

Nothing special here, just a good solid Bob Steele programmer.