Hot Picks
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Texas Masquerade
USA 1944
produced by Harry Sherman for United Artists
directed by George Archainbaud
starring William Boyd, Andy Clyde, Jimmy Rogers, Don Costello, Mady Correll, Francis McDonald, Russell Simpson, J.Farrell MacDonald, Nelson Leigh, Robert McKenzie, June Pickerell, Pierce Lyden, Bill Hunter, John Merton, Snub Pollard, Ralph Bucko, Roy Bucko, Bob Burns, George Morrell
screenplay by Jack Lait jr, Norman Houston, based on characters created by Clarence E. Mulford, musical director: Irvin Talbot
Hopalong Cassidy
review by Mike Haberfelner
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When Hopalong Cassidy (William Boyd) learns about a gang of Night
Riders setting fire to ranches over in a Texas town, he and his
sidekicks California (Andy Clyde) and Jimmy (Jimmy Rogers) head there,
with Hoppy posing as an effeminate weakling from Boston and his pals as
ineffective farmhands - and all three are so good in their roles that they
even drive Virginia (Mady Correll), the woman who hired them, to despair.
Hoppy however has long found out what's going on, some gang of ruffians
try to drive honest farmers off their land, not because their land is
especially prosperous (in fact it isn't) but because it sits on a fortune
in oil. And by pute instinct, Hoppy has also figured out the leadeers of
the Night Riders, crooked bar owner Ace (Don Costello) and the respectable
banker and secret landgrabber Trimble (Russell Simpson).
In the end, Hoppy of course drops his disguise, leads the Night Riders
into a trap, and in the final shoot-out Ace is shot, while Trimble, trying
to make a getaway on foot, drowns in the local swamp ...
Little more than a routine B-Western. Seeing Hoppy as an effeminate
weakling is of course good for a few laughs, but actually, William Boyd
isn't versatile enough an actor to pull it off for the whole length of the
movie, plus the gag has also been used earlier in the series, e.g. Sunset
Trail.
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