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Dave Carson (George Chesebro), a peaceful rancher, is rounded up by a group called the vigilantes, accused of rustling, and hung from the next tree. Bab Halliday (Frances Gladwin), daughter of Carson's next door neighbour (Karl Hackett), witnesses the whole thing, but is too far away to identify any of the vigilantes. But when she rushes home, she finds her father taken care of by the local veterinarian Doc Jones (Al St. John), which objectively excludes him from the circle of suspects - not that she would ever have suspected him, but then again there were rumours in town that Carson had stolen cattle from Halliday. The man who's really behind everything is of course Kirby (Charles King), a local landowner who has the habit of buying ranches in the neighbourhood at half their asking price - abd he plans to go for Halliday's ranch next, which is why he sends his right hand man Slade (Kermit Maynard) over to the next city just to Carson's hot-headed hephew Billy (Buster Crabbe) learns about his uncle's demise. Billy of course rushes into town to kill Halliday for the lynching of his uncle, but Bab and Doc Jones manage to just about convince him that he's not the guilty party. So with Doc Jones' help, Billy does some investigating and soon starts to suspect Slade - and of course, he soon enough walks into a trap when Slade shoots Halliday dead and puts the blame filmly on Billy. Billy's arrested for the murder, but the doc manages to drug the sheriff (Budd Buster) and spring Billy from jail, just before a lynch mob led by Kirby can get hold of him and hang him from the next tree. Billy once again trails Slade and finds him at Halliday's ranch where he tries to make Bab sign over the deed to her father's land. Billy ultimately shoots Slade dead then gets his hands on his accomplice Dawson (Jack Ingram) and threatens to hand him if he doesn't talk. And ultimately, just before the sheriff's posse arrives at Bab's place, Billly and the doc ride back into town and Billy beats a confession out of Kirby. And when the posse after Billy returns, Billy has already put all the right people into jail and started to romance Bab.

Buster Crabbe's Billy Carson series sure was a very mixed cattle of fish, ,with many of the entries being naive, childish, silly, or all three of the above - but this one's definitely one of the better movies, with its grim, almost nihilistic story, a plot that twists and turns a bit and offers suspense in addition to the expected cowboy action, Buster at his toughest (and making a good job of it), and even Al St. John being more than just the funny sidekick (though he still does some fun slapstick). Now of course, I'd be hard pressed to call this a masterpiece in the traditional sense of the word, but for a B western from a small studio from past the B western's golden age, this is a very decent effort.

review © by Mike Haberfelner

 

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