Johnny Mack Brown came to Raleigh, NC a good 20 years before I moved there. My timing has never been all that good. Colorado Ambush (1952) is a good one, written by the picture’s bad guy, Myron Healey.
Archive for the ‘Johnny Mack Brown’ Category
December 4, 1952, Raleigh, NC.
Posted in 1952, Johnny Mack Brown, Monogram/Allied Artists, Myron Healey on July 8, 2025| 4 Comments »
Blu-Ray Review: Western Renegades (1949).
Posted in DVD/Blu-Ray Reviews, Johnny Mack Brown, Monogram/Allied Artists, Myron Healey, Warner Archive on April 6, 2025| 7 Comments »
Directed by Wallace Fox
Supervisor: Eddie Davis
Original Screenplay by Adele Buffington
Director Of Photography: Harry Neumann
Film Editor: John C. Fuller
Cast: Johnny Mack Brown (Himself), Max Terhune (Alibi), Poni Adams (Judy Gordon), Hugh Prosser (Jim Laren), Riley Hill (Joe Gordon), Marshall Reed (Frank), Constance Worth (Ann Gordon), Steve Clark (Dusty Dekker), Terry Frost (Carl), William Ruhl (Curly), John Merton (Blacksmith), Myron Healey (Gus)
Warner Archive’s announcement of the Monogram Matinee #1 Blu-Ray was a reason for much rejoicing around here. And if you ask me, now that it’s here, the rejoicing can continue. This thing’s great.
It puts three Monogram Westerns from 1949 on a single disc: Mississippi Rhythm starring Jimmie Davis, Western Renegades with Johnny Mack Brown, and Whip Wilson in Crashing Thru. No frills other than terrific transfers.
The picture I went to first was Western Renegades (1949).
Marshall Johnny Mack Brown rides into Gordonville to visit his old friend Dusty Dekker (Steve Clark), and before we’re four minutes into the picture, Johnny’s plugged two guys and a well-to-do rancher is murdered. Not long after that, we learn of a plot cooked up by some of the locals to snatch the dead man’s ranch from his two adult children, with an actress passed off as the rancher’s long-lost wife — and with Dusty framed for it.
Monogram’s Johnny Mack Brown Westerns are a lot of fun. He’s likable, he rides well and he has a cool hat. (Hats are very important in these things.) His Southern accent is real, another plus. And there’s usually plenty of action.
Max Terhune isn’t given a lot to do as Alibi this time around, but it’s always nice to see him (and Elmer). Myron Healey doesn’t have a lot of screen time in one of those parts often listed as “henchman,” though he’s called Gus here.
While it’s easy to see that these things were made with an eye on the clock, the pros putting them together always seem to come through. Harry Neumann’s camerawork in Western Renegades is nice, especially if you consider the time, or lack of it, he had to get things set up.
Neumann’s work is presented quite nicely here. It’s always a treat to see B Westerns look this good, where we can appreciate the craft required to make movies this quickly and cheaply.
The Monogram John Mack Brown films are well represented in Warner Archive’s older DVD series, Monogram Cowboy Collection. (If you’re reading this far into this, trust me, you need those.)
If sets like this Monogram Matinee are how things are going to move forward, bring ’em on! Highly recommended.
Blu-Ray News #385: Monogram Matinee, Volume 1 (1949).
Posted in DVD/Blu-Ray News, Johnny Mack Brown, Monogram/Allied Artists, Warner Archive, Whip Wilson on February 6, 2025| 21 Comments »
Now THIS is good news! Of late, we’ve been complaining about Monogram pictures being absent from Warner Archive’s new release lists. Well, we jumped the gun. They’ve just announced a Blu-Ray packed with three long-unseen Monogram Pictures from 1949 — coming in March. Can’t wait!
Mississippi Rhythm
Directed by Derwin Abrahams
Starring Jimmie Davis, Veda Ann Borg, Lee White, Sue England, James Flavin, Paul Maxey
Crashing Thru
Directed by Ray Taylor
Starring Whip Wilson, Andy Clyde, Christine Larson, Tris Coffin, Steve Darrell, George J. Lewis
Western Renegades
Directed by Wallace Fox
Starring Johnny Mack Brown, Max Terhune, Poni Adams, Hugh Prosser, Riley Hill, Marshall Reed
What has me really stoked about this is that it’s listed as Volume 1, meaning there will be more. Bring ’em on!
DVD Review: Texas City (1952).
Posted in 1952, Bud Osbourne, DVD/Blu-Ray Reviews, Johnny Mack Brown, Lewis D. Collins, Lois Hall, Lyle Talbot, Monogram/Allied Artists, Russell Hayden, Warner Archive on February 11, 2024| 1 Comment »
Directed by Lewis D. Collins
Produced by Vincent M. Fennelly
Written by Joseph F. Poland
Director Of Photography: Ernest Miller
Film Editor: Sam Fields
Music by Raoul Kraushaar
Cast: Johnny Mack Brown (Marshal Johnny Mack Brown), James Ellison (Jim Kirby), Lois Hall (Lois Upton), Terry Frost (Trag), Lane Bradford (Hank), Lyle Talbot (Captain Hamilton), Marshall Reed (Yarnell), Pierce Lyden (Marshal George Markham), Lorna Thayer (Aunt Harriet), Bud Osborne, Bill Coontz, John Hart
Seemed like a Lyle Talbot kind of day, so I pulled out Monogram’s Texas City (1952) starring Johnny Mack Brown — a solid little Western produced toward the end of Brown’s run at Monogram.
After a series of Army gold shipments are held up, Marshall Johnny Mack Brown is brought in to investigate. He suspects that the crooks are using the ghost town of Dawson City as their base. There he meets Lois Upton (Lois Hall), a young lady who’s just come West after inheriting the town’s dilapidated hotel and Jim Kirby (James Ellison), a young man who arouses Johnny Mack’s suspicions.
This one’s got everything: gold shipment robberies, a ghost town, a cave hideout (with a secret entrance behind a grandfather clock), a pretty girl from back East, Bud Osbourne driving the stage and, of course, Lyle Talbot as a crooked cavalry officer.
One of my favorite things about the Johnny Mack Brown Monograms is his hat. (Never underestimate the power of a good hat in a Western.) Conversely, Lyle Talbot’s hat is just terrible. He must’ve made somebody mad in the Monogram wardrobe department.
Lois Hall was in three Johnny Mack pictures, a couple Whip Wilson things, two Durango Kids, some Sam Katzman serials at Columbia and Republic’s Daughter Of The Jungle (1949). She’s usually terrific, but she doesn’t have a lot to do in this one. James Ellison had been in the early Hopalong Cassidy pictures, I Walked With A Zombie (1941) and a series of Lippert Westerns co-starring Russell Hayden. Not long after Texas City, Ellison would leave the picture business for real estate.
John Hart appears as a cavalryman in the opening shootout — about a year before he (temporarily) replaced Clayton Moore on The Lone Ranger. Lorna Thayer, who plays Lois Hall’s aunt, later played the waitress who winds up on Jack Nicholson’s bad side in Five Easy Pieces (1970).
Texas City is one of nine Monogram Westerns included in Volume 4 of Warner Archive’s Monogram Cowboy Collection. It has all three pictures Lois Hall did with Johnny Mack Brown.
Texas City was beautifully shot by Ernest Miller, making good use of locations we’ve all seen a hundred times. So it’s nice to see Miller’s work well-presented here. Though it obviously wasn’t given what we’d call a full restoration today, the transfer is excellent. These Monogram Western sets are wonderful, one of my favorite things Warner Archive has done. If you don’t have ’em, you’re really missing out. Highly, highly recommended.
DVD Review: Colorado Ambush (1951).
Posted in 1951, DVD/Blu-Ray Reviews, Johnny Mack Brown, Lewis D. Collins, Lois Hall, Lyle Talbot, Monogram/Allied Artists, Myron Healey, Warner Archive on September 11, 2023| 1 Comment »
Directed by Lewis Collins
Produced by Vincent M. Fennelly
Screenplay by Myron Healey
Director Of Photography: Gilbert Warrenton
Film Editor: Fred Maguire
Music by Edward J. Kay
Cast: Johnny Mack Brown (Johnny Mack Brown), Myron Healey (Chet Murdock), Lois Hall (Janet Williams), Tommy Farrell (Terry Williams), Christine McIntyre (Mae Star), Lee Roberts (Gus), Marshall Bradford (Ben Williams), Lyle Talbot (Sheriff Ed Lowery)
Lois Hall came up recently when Imprint Films announced their upcoming Blu-Ray set Tales Of Adventure, Collection Two — which has her starring in Republic’s Daughter Of The Jungle (1949). And since I’ve been meaning to revisit the Warner Archive Monogram Cowboy Collection sets, why not take a look at one of Miss Hall’s Johnny Mack Brown pictures? Conveniently, all three are on Volume 4 of that terrific series.
In Colorado Ambush (1951), somebody’s picking off Wells Fargo riders to get ahold of the payroll. It looks like an inside job, and Johnny Mack Brown is sent to investigate. He soon meets the Williams family — father Marshall Bradford, daughter Lois Hall and son Tommy Farrell — who care for Wells Fargo’s horses and are in charge of transporting the payroll. Only they know when a rider is carrying the money.
Turns out Farrell’s in cahoots with the ruthless Myron Healey and Christine McIntyre to ambush the riders toting the dough. And when Brown and sheriff Lyle Talbot start to sort out the scheme and things go south for the crooks, the bullets fly and the bodies start piling up. There’s not a lot of the cast left breathing at the end of the picture’s 51 minutes.
Monogram’s B Westerns of the late 40s and early 50s were obviously done on the skinny, both time-wise and financially. But there’s usually plenty of shootin’ and ridin’, some great character actors — and of course terrific leads like Wild Bill Elliott and Johnny Mack Brown. What’s more, they tend to be more adult than what you expect from pictures like this. And in the case of the Johnny Mack Brown films, there’s the added benefit of the wonderful hats he wears.
In an interview with Boyd Magers, Lois Hall said of Johnny Mack Brown: “I feel the same thing everybody else says about him…a true gentleman. And a little distant. He wasn’t one to sit around the set. He went back to his dressing room between things. But a very pleasant person.” Brown was evidently as likable on the set as he is on the screen.
Myron Healey is not only the villain in Colorado Ambush, he was also the screenwriter. His script is pretty clever — how the bad guys know when the riders are carrying the cash is rather ingenious. Healey scripted another Johnny Mack picture, Texas Lawmen (1951).
Lyle Talbot plays the sheriff, an old friend of Brown’s. This was about a year after Talbot appeared as Lex Luther in the serial Atom Man Vs. Superman (1950). It’s always a treat when Talbot shows up in something, and since he made a point of never turning down work, he turns up quite a bit.
Lewis Collins directed dozens of Westerns like this, including some of the William Elliott and Whip Wilson Monograms (oh, and 1950’s Hot Rod) that were being done around the same time Colorado Ambush was released. Collins died of a heart attack in 1956. He’s a bit like Lesley Selander — you can count on him to make a decent, fast-moving Western under about any circumstances.
As I mentioned earlier, Colorado Ambush is included in Volume 4 of Warner Archive’s Monogram Cowboy Collection, a nine-picture set that also includes some Jimmy Wakely films. It gives you all three Brown Westerns co-starring Lois Hall, the other two being Blazing Bullets (1951) and Texas City (1952). The films look great — even though they don’t get an actual restoration, the transfers are very nicely done. Personally, I kinda like some dust or scratches here and there, and there are a few incidents of each in Colorado Ambush. The sound’s excellent. I wish Warner Archive had kept digging around in the Monogram vaults. The stuff they put out are some of the real joys of my collection.
Colorado Ambush, this set, the Monogram Cowboy Collection and anything else Warner Archive gave us from Monogram is highly recommended. You’re not gonna come across a masterpiece, but you’re certainly gonna be entertained.
Pre-50s Westerns DVD News #290: Monogram Cowboy Collection #10: Johnny Mack Brown.
Posted in DVD/Blu-Ray News, Johnny Mack Brown, Lambert Hillyer, Monogram/Allied Artists, Raymond Hatton, Warner Archive on December 17, 2019| 1 Comment »
Warner Archive has announced the 10th and final volume in their Monogram Cowboy Collection series.
It features nine Johnny Mack Brown pictures from 1946-49 —
The Haunted Mine (1946)
Valley Of Fear (1947)
Crossed Trails (1947)
Triggerman (1947)
Back Trail (1947)
Gunning For Justice (1948)
Range Justice (1948)
Trail Ends (1949)
Western Renegades (1949)
While I sure hate to see this terrific series reach the end of the trail, Warner Archive promises more: “Fear not – further oaters are on deck in more modestly sized editions!”
DVD Review: Canyon Ambush (1952).
Posted in 1952, DVD/Blu-Ray Reviews, Johnny Mack Brown, Lewis D. Collins, Monogram/Allied Artists, Phyllis Coates, Warner Archive on September 29, 2017| 20 Comments »
Directed by Lewis Collins
Written by Joseph Poland
Director Of Photography: Ernest Miller
Music by Raoul Kraushaar
Cast: Johnny Mack Brown (Himself), Lee Roberts (Sheriff Bob Conway), Phyllis Coates (Marian Gaylord), Hugh Prosser (George Millarde), Dennis Moore (Henry Lockwood), Marshall Reed (Macklin)
__________
The last of Johnny Mack Brown’s B Westerns for Monogram, Canyon Ambush (1952) is pretty much exactly what you’re picturing in your head — a pretty solid little picture shot at Iverson Ranch. In it, Brown’s a government agent who rides into Border City to help bring a masked rider to justice. There’s plenty of ridin’ and shootin’ all over the hallowed grounds of the Iverson Ranch, and Phyllis Coates is on hand to give the picture an extra boost — and plenty of curb appeal.
The screenplay’s by Joseph Poland, who wrote a ton of B Westerns (Autry, Wayne, Elliott) and serials (Dick Tracy Vs. Crime Inc., Batman And Robin and Atom Man Vs. Superman).
At the time Canyon Ambush was in production, Monogram was in the process of becoming Allied Artists. William Elliott stayed and made a few more pictures with the typical Monogram team (Lewis Collins, Thomas Carr, Ernest Miller, etc.); Johnny Mack Brown retired.
Canyon Ambush is available on DVD from Warner Archive’s Monogram Cowboy Collection Volume 5. The three-disc set also includes Brown and Raymond Hatton in The Texas Kid (1943), Partners Of The Trail (1944), Law Men(1944), Ghost Guns (1944), Gun Smoke (1945), Frontier Feud (1945), Border Bandits (1946) and Raiders Of The South (1947). Canyon Ambush looks terrific, stunning at times. The contrast levels are beautiful, giving us a chance to really take in the wonders of the Iverson Ranch. (One more thing: Johnny Mack Brown has a really cool hat in this one.)
50s Westerns DVD/Blu-Ray News #244: Warner Archive Christmas In July Sale – 4 For $44.
Posted in Johnny Mack Brown, Lesley Selander, Monogram/Allied Artists, Myron Healey, Rod Cameron, Warner Archive on July 12, 2017| 42 Comments »
Warner Archive has kicked of their Christmas In July Sale — which lets you get four titles for just $44 with free shipping. This is a great, great thing — and it includes Blu-Rays!
Lesley Selander’s Short Grass (1950) with Rod Cameron and Johnny Mack Brown is one to consider. Click the banner to start shopping.
Making Movies: Whistling Hills (1951).
Posted in 1951, Johnny Mack Brown, Locations/Ranches, Making Movies, Monogram/Allied Artists, Warner Archive on August 22, 2016| 4 Comments »
Stephen Lodge is a very nice man who, as a kid, got to visit some Western movie and TV sets. (His aunt worked for Monogram.) One of those visits was to the Iverson Ranch while Johnny Mack Brown was shooting Whistling Hills (1951). I’ve “borrowed” the next few snapshots from his website, which I encourage you to check out.
First, Stephen and his brother meet Johnny Mack Brown.
Brown with his costar, Noel Neill.
Brown at the saloon on Iverson’s Western street. There are plenty of other photos on Lodge’s site, along with a great writeup of his time on the Iverson Ranch.
Whistling Hills is available on Warner Archive’s Monogram Cowboy Collection Volume 7.
50s Westerns DVD News #221: The Monogram Cowboy Collection Volume 9.
Posted in DVD reviews, releases, TV, etc., Johnny Mack Brown, Lambert Hillyer, Monogram/Allied Artists, Raymond Hatton, Thomas Carr, Warner Archive on August 19, 2016| 11 Comments »
Warner Archive is about to offer up their ninth volume of their Monogram Cowboy Collection. This one’s all Johnny Mack Brown, nine pictures on three discs.
The Gentleman From Texas (1946)
Trailing Danger (1947)
Flashing Guns (1947)
Land Of The Lawless (1947)
Code Of The Saddle (1947)
Law Comes To Gunsight (1947)
The Fighting Ranger (1948)
Frontier Agent (1948)
The Sheriff Of Medicine Bow (1948)
All feature Raymond Hatton and were directed by Lambert Hillyer, except for Code Of The Saddle coming from Thomas Carr.
The release date is September 13.
50 Westerns From The 50s.