Complete credited cast: | |||
Gene Autry | ... | Gene Autry | |
Smiley Burnette | ... | Frog Millhouse | |
June Storey | ... | Caroline Stanhope | |
Mary Lee | ... | Patsy Stanhope | |
Eddy Waller | ... | Colonel Stanhope | |
Hardie Albright | ... | Henry Wheeler | |
Frank Dae | ... | Colonel Jefferson | |
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Terry Nibert | ... | Evangeline Jefferson |
Robert Fiske | ... | Barrett | |
Etta McDaniel | ... | Mammy | |
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Paul White | ... | Billy |
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Fred A. Ritter | ... | Thompson (as Fred Ritter) |
Ralph Sanford | ... | Foreman Nelson | |
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Texas Jim Lewis and His Lone Star Cowboys | ... | Musicians (as Jimmie Lewis and his Texas Cowboys) |
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Texas Jim Lewis | ... | Bass Player (as Jimmie Lewis and his Texas Cowboys) |
Gene Autry (Himself) and Frog Millhouse (Smiley Burnette) encounter Caroline Stanhope (June Storey) who has come to town with her father, Colonel Stanhope (Eddy Waller), to enter her horse in the rodeo, hoping to clear enough money to clear the mortgage on their home back in Carolina. She ignores Gene's advice that the horse is too temperamental for the rodeo noise and commotion, and the horse sprains an ankle. The Colonel, taken by a couple of crooks, loses a thousand dollars in wagers and refuses to turn over his only asset, the horse, in lieu of the cash. Gene, wishing to help, offers Stanhope a thousand dollars for the horse but Caroline thinking Gene is in with the crooks, loads the horse in a trailer and heads back for Carolina. Gene, thinking the Stanhopes are in a scheme to beat him out of his money, takes Frog and follows them. There, they discover the Stanhopes are honest people, who, along with their neighbors are hard-pressed by poverty and a threatened foreclosure of ... Written by Les Adams <longhorn1939@suddenlink.net>
It's another excellent Gene Autry western, with Smiley ("Frog") Burnette and June ("nice legs, ma'am") Storey in tow who could ask for anything more? Also with that nice early '40's Republic atmosphere and a whole bunch of nice songs too.
The IMDb plot outline virtually gives the whole story away, but essentially Gene and Frog come to the rescue of plantation damsel in distress and her still Rebel grandfather. Do our heroes manage to save them from the clutches of the land-grabbing baddies out to buy up the entire countryside to augment their capitalist greed? June of course is at her wits end, but it doesn't stop her smiling along and duetting with Gene, especially the dreamy Dreaming Dreams (walking in the moonlight, with Champion too) and Say Si Si (at the piano at her plantation). Gene's solo highlight came with a too short version of the title song, whilst the Old Folks At Home got a spirited rendition from the plantation Negroes in a scene guaranteed to disturb any modern serious person brought up only on modern serious endless gratuitous sex and violence in films. For all of our sakes then I hope none of them ever see this!
Gene is wonderfully imperturbable, Smiley has his usual farcical subplot going off throughout, there's some witty smart-ass one liners thrown in. And June even has the last word - in short, although there's many of his films I've never seen it's one of my favourite Autry's.