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A gangster known only as theShadow is terrorizing a small Western town,
and only John Wayne and his saddle-pal, the Indian Yak (Yakima Canutt) are there to stop him. So
Wayne holds up a stagecoach himself in order to thwart a holdup by the
Shadows henchmen. Infuriated about this though, they shoot the stage's
drivers, having the horses run wild and Verna Hillie, the sole
passenger, to her certain doom ... would it not be for Wayne again to
jump onto the speeding stage and stop the wild horses.
Back in town a new sheriff is sworn in, but no sooner does he step
out on the street is he gunned down, with the assassin nowhere to be
seen.
"If it's just the same to you folks, I'll take that job of
sheriff," says Wayne, and his investigations soon lead him to
Matlock's (George Hayes) farm, which is half-owned by Verna Hillie due
to her father (the original co-owner) killed by the Shadow. Soon,
though, the Shadow wants Hillie driven off the farm for some reason -
with little success - and soon Wayne and Yak find out (little
surprisingly) that Matlock is actually the Shadow. A massive showdown
that involves some 40 horseriders and a machinegun on a covered wagon
that falls over a cliff in the end, puts an end to the Shadow's evil
deeds ...
John Wayne's B-Westerns for Monogram are all pretty good (he did 16
of them between 1933 and 1935) and this one's no exception. A great
many of them were directed by Robert N. Bradbury, who is regarded by many
(and I happen to agree) as the most imaginative B-Western directors of
his time. In this one he successfully blends Western- and murder-mystery-elements, while never letting the action take second
seat. Stunts, as usual in Wayne's Monograms, are handled by Yakima
Canutt, most probably the best stuntman of his time, maybe of all times,
who also had small roles in many of them, speaking in his unmistakingly
snarling voice, most of the time as the villain's head henchman. Here he
plays the heroes sidekick and comedy relief though. George Hayes, here
seen as the villain, also played in most of Wayne's Monograms, usually
as the hero's sidekick or the father of the heroine. Later he would
(along with Fuzzy Al St.John) become one of the leading bearded
sidekicks in many a B-Western, often being the saddlepal of Roy Rogers and
being Windy on the long running and highly popular Hopalong
Cassidy-series (he doesn't have his beard in Star Packer,
though).
For
those inclined, also check out the video review of The Star Packer I
did with filmmaker Sean Weathers, with the movie in its entirety playing
afterwards.
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