The Texas Terror
1935
John Wayne. George Hayes.
Directed by Robert Bradbury
Lone Star Productions
In between The Big Trail (1930) and Stagecoach (1939) John Wayne found himself in poverty row churning out B-movie after B-movie. Some of these are dire and some are very very good.
Texas Terror falls somewhere between the two extremes and is a fun, rough and tumble slice of the young Duke in action, not to mention George Hayes before he became George "Gabby" Hayes or, as often billed Gabby Hayes.
Unusual for a 1935 budget picture is the fact that the Indians are not portrayed as out and out blood thirsty savages - indeed in this movie they are good guys and actually befriend John Wayne's character.
The plot is well signposted in the dialogue and the action is non stop. There are a couple of anachronistic moments since the film is set in what seems a period immediately following the civil war and yet there are early telephones and motor cars in the movie. The fact that Wayne is able to drive the car at one point is not explained.
There are several ways to get this film - it's on the public domain and can be either downloaded or streamed at the internet archive. It is also available to watch here on The ARCHIVE as an embedded video (below).
Or the DVD pictured is worth the slim price since this region 0 Disc also contains The Dawn Rider and The Trail Beyond. And there has been some remastering to both the sound and vision.
1 comment:
I am a big fan of these old Lone Star Westerns, even though they were really shot on the cheap and tend to have very basic plots.
Director/Writer Robert Bradbury churned out dozens and dozens of Westerns during the 30's, many of which star John Wayne.
Regarding Indians, it's pretty typical of Bradbury's films to portray Native Americans in a different light than other Westerns did.
I also recently posted a full online version of another Lonestar starring Wayne that was made the same year as "The Texas Terror". In addition to having a full version of "The Star Packer", there are also a few details about Bradbury.
Check it out here:
http://old-west.blogspot.com/
KerbyJackson.com
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