This is the first Roy Rogers film I've ever seen in its entirety, although I watched many an episode of his TV show in my younger years. It was a passable B western, with some fine Yakima Canutt stunts, and features an appearance by a veteran of John Wayne's old Lone Star westerns, Jack Rockwell, as a stagecoach driver. Roy, Sally Payne and Gabby sing some fair but forgettable songs, Sally and Gabby's scenes together are a hoot, and Julie Bishop and Trigger both look as comely as ever. The screenwriters in typical Hollywood fashion play fast and loose with the history of these characters and their times.(The notion of anybody trying to take California away from the U.S. is ridiculous, Wild Bill and Calamity didn't meet until almost a dozen years after the Civil War and both were pretty homely looking even by 19th century standards.) All in all, some parts of this film are quite entertaining, it's mostly pleasing to the eye and ear, and it's not a bad way to kill an hour. Dale Roloff
9 Reviews
A lot of enjoyable historical nonsense.
planktonrules11 January 2011
Hollywood had a huge love affair with westerns up until about 1960. Most of the ways they portrayed the west were complete nonsense and they had a habit of injecting real-life characters into situations that never occurred. Heck, the lives of Billy the Kid, Jesse James, Wyatt Earp and Bill Hickok are completely unrecognizable in the hundreds and hundreds of films in which they appear. "Young Bill Hickok" is yet another one of these entirely fictitious films from this era and it even throws in Calamity Jane (a rather unattractive woman in real life) to boot. Playing so fast and loose with the truth drives history teachers like me crazy, but my love of a fun B-movie kept me watching.
Roy Rogers plays Bill Hickok and he looked even less like Bill than Gabby Hays who is on hand (as usual) to play Roy's loyal sidekick. As for the plot, it's all a lot of nonsense about Bill tracking down some Confederate raiders and their unknown leader as well as Bill wanting to marry a Southern lady. I won't bother going into any more details as none of it seemed to bear any semblance to Hickok's life.
Overall, the film is a pretty ordinary Roy Rogers film. There's lots of singing for no apparent reason, Hays is quite funny in support and in the end good triumphs over evil. The only moment of the film that really caught my attention was the jail break--that was very clever and you just need to see it. Worth seeing for Rogers fans--otherwise just another one of 23281235413 B-series westerns.
Roy Rogers plays Bill Hickok and he looked even less like Bill than Gabby Hays who is on hand (as usual) to play Roy's loyal sidekick. As for the plot, it's all a lot of nonsense about Bill tracking down some Confederate raiders and their unknown leader as well as Bill wanting to marry a Southern lady. I won't bother going into any more details as none of it seemed to bear any semblance to Hickok's life.
Overall, the film is a pretty ordinary Roy Rogers film. There's lots of singing for no apparent reason, Hays is quite funny in support and in the end good triumphs over evil. The only moment of the film that really caught my attention was the jail break--that was very clever and you just need to see it. Worth seeing for Rogers fans--otherwise just another one of 23281235413 B-series westerns.
Mild Bill Hickock
FightingWesterner28 March 2010
Warning: Spoilers
In the final days of the Civil War, young Bill Hickock (Roy Rogers) is sent by the War Department to deliver a shipment of gold for the Union cause. Acting as a decoy, he sends the gold with Gabby Hayes and Hayes' sidekick Calamity Jane (!), hoping to outsmart the European backed saboteurs that want to take it.
Not so wild this time around, Young Bill Hickock's bland script takes too much time getting started and doesn't really generate much excitement or great music. This Republic Picture does have some decent production values though.
Astonishingly, the script veers into JFK style conspiracy theories near the end, with European powers using John Wilkes Booth as a pawn in order to divide the US again, in order to gain control of the west! However, it's still not enough to make this really worth recommending, except for maybe the most die-hard Roy Rogers fans.
The best thing in the movie is the feisty performance by Sally Payne as Calamity Jane. She's pretty cute and does a good job.
Not so wild this time around, Young Bill Hickock's bland script takes too much time getting started and doesn't really generate much excitement or great music. This Republic Picture does have some decent production values though.
Astonishingly, the script veers into JFK style conspiracy theories near the end, with European powers using John Wilkes Booth as a pawn in order to divide the US again, in order to gain control of the west! However, it's still not enough to make this really worth recommending, except for maybe the most die-hard Roy Rogers fans.
The best thing in the movie is the feisty performance by Sally Payne as Calamity Jane. She's pretty cute and does a good job.
Roy Rogers sides with Calamity Jane in historical B-western
BrianDanaCamp3 July 2002
In his early years at Republic Pictures, Roy Rogers specialized in historical westerns (DAYS OF JESSE JAMES, BILLY THE KID RETURNS), in contrast with the contemporary settings of his wartime and postwar westerns (DON'T FENCE ME IN, THE GOLDEN STALLION, etc.). YOUNG BILL HICKOK (1940) casts Rogers in the title role and dramatizes the famed gunfighter's first meeting with Calamity Jane (played by Sally Payne in the first onscreen portrayal of the character since Cecil B. DeMille's epic western of 1936, THE PLAINSMAN, which also featured Hickok and paired him with Buffalo Bill, who's absent from this film).
The film starts out promisingly as it details a plot by an unnamed foreign power to take advantage of the divisions of the then-raging Civil War to try to take over California. John Miljan plays the foreign agent, Nicholas Tower, without a trace of an accent or any other hint of which country he's supposed to represent. (The name Nicholas may signal a Russian origin, but weren't the Soviets our wartime allies?) Tower conspires with Morrell (Hal Taliaferro), a local outlaw, to disrupt the stage lines serving California, and when Morrell's Raiders go into action, they run afoul of young Bill Hickok (dubbed Wild Bill by a reporter for "the Chronicle") who soon allies with wagon freighter Gabby Whitaker (Gabby Hayes) and his salty young female partner, Calamity Jane. After introducing all the characters and setting up the basic premise, which offered a good deal of potential for suspense, the action quickly settles into familiar B-western territory as Hickok has to defend himself against a charge of masterminding the theft of a gold shipment he was assigned to guard. Gabby and Jane spring him from jail and work to get the goods on Tower. At a certain point it becomes simply one chase after another, albeit with the usual topflight Republic stunt work.
While the drama wavers in the second half, the spirit of fun is maintained by the delightful performances of Gabby Hayes, in his trademark wizened old westerner role, and the film's genuine revelation, Sally Payne, as the no-nonsense Calamity Jane, whose command of western vernacular is equaled only by Gabby's. (A horse is never a horse, but a "Cayuse.") The homely, mannish Jane was always a challenge to Hollywood, which couldn't resist the urge to make her pretty by casting such top stars as Jean Arthur (THE PLAINSMAN), Yvonne De Carlo (CALAMITY JANE AND SAM BASS) and Doris Day (CALAMITY JANE) in the role. Here she looks and sounds a little closer perhaps to what the real woman was like, although the best Calamity Jane onscreen may arguably be Ellen Barkin in Walter Hill's WILD BILL (1995).
There are a handful of short songs that don't intrude much on the action, including one performed together by Gabby and Sally. Special mention should be made of B-western regular Hal Taliaferro (aka Wally Wales) who delivers a sharp portrayal of bandit Morrell who distrusts the "foreigner" Tower but takes the job anyway because the pay is good. Long-haired, unshaven and tall, with piercing eyes, Taliaferro cut a suitably seedy and menacing figure but with a touch of humanity. It's too bad the importance of his character diminishes as the film progresses, with Tower taking up greater screen time. Iron Eyes Cody is on hand as one of Gabby's Indian workers. Jacqueline Wells (aka Julie Bishop) plays northerner Hickok's southern-born fiancee, lending a bit of romantic conflict to the equation as they bicker about the ongoing war.
The film starts out promisingly as it details a plot by an unnamed foreign power to take advantage of the divisions of the then-raging Civil War to try to take over California. John Miljan plays the foreign agent, Nicholas Tower, without a trace of an accent or any other hint of which country he's supposed to represent. (The name Nicholas may signal a Russian origin, but weren't the Soviets our wartime allies?) Tower conspires with Morrell (Hal Taliaferro), a local outlaw, to disrupt the stage lines serving California, and when Morrell's Raiders go into action, they run afoul of young Bill Hickok (dubbed Wild Bill by a reporter for "the Chronicle") who soon allies with wagon freighter Gabby Whitaker (Gabby Hayes) and his salty young female partner, Calamity Jane. After introducing all the characters and setting up the basic premise, which offered a good deal of potential for suspense, the action quickly settles into familiar B-western territory as Hickok has to defend himself against a charge of masterminding the theft of a gold shipment he was assigned to guard. Gabby and Jane spring him from jail and work to get the goods on Tower. At a certain point it becomes simply one chase after another, albeit with the usual topflight Republic stunt work.
While the drama wavers in the second half, the spirit of fun is maintained by the delightful performances of Gabby Hayes, in his trademark wizened old westerner role, and the film's genuine revelation, Sally Payne, as the no-nonsense Calamity Jane, whose command of western vernacular is equaled only by Gabby's. (A horse is never a horse, but a "Cayuse.") The homely, mannish Jane was always a challenge to Hollywood, which couldn't resist the urge to make her pretty by casting such top stars as Jean Arthur (THE PLAINSMAN), Yvonne De Carlo (CALAMITY JANE AND SAM BASS) and Doris Day (CALAMITY JANE) in the role. Here she looks and sounds a little closer perhaps to what the real woman was like, although the best Calamity Jane onscreen may arguably be Ellen Barkin in Walter Hill's WILD BILL (1995).
There are a handful of short songs that don't intrude much on the action, including one performed together by Gabby and Sally. Special mention should be made of B-western regular Hal Taliaferro (aka Wally Wales) who delivers a sharp portrayal of bandit Morrell who distrusts the "foreigner" Tower but takes the job anyway because the pay is good. Long-haired, unshaven and tall, with piercing eyes, Taliaferro cut a suitably seedy and menacing figure but with a touch of humanity. It's too bad the importance of his character diminishes as the film progresses, with Tower taking up greater screen time. Iron Eyes Cody is on hand as one of Gabby's Indian workers. Jacqueline Wells (aka Julie Bishop) plays northerner Hickok's southern-born fiancee, lending a bit of romantic conflict to the equation as they bicker about the ongoing war.
'Hollywood history' intervenes, but doesn't dominate.
weezeralfalfa27 February 2019
Warning: Spoilers
I thought one of the neatest things about this fictionalized Civil War western occurs early, when Roy(as Bill Hickok) is the lone defender of a lonely Overland stage relay station being attacked by some Overland raiders, lead by seedy-looking Hal Tallaferro(as Morrell). He took a direct hit in his heart area, but was saved by a metallic picture case in his shirt pocket, containing a picture of his sweetheart. This reminds me of a similar lifesaver for Teddy Roosevelt. He was giving a long political speech at a rally, when a gunman shot him in the heart area. However, it was slowed sufficiently by going through the thick layer of note paper in his left pocket that it didn't make it all the way to his heart. It did, however, cause bleeding, which TR ignored until the end of his speech! ........The screenplay is a confusing wild tale about a foreign agent(John Miljan, as Tower), who arrives in San Francisco with orders to foment civil war there, toward wresting the state from the US. During the Civil War, the Union troops will be busy fighting the Confederates in the East. At this late stage in the Civil War, Tower has writing contact with one John Wilkes Booth, in the East, who expresses his hatred of Lincoln and determination to kill him. This suggests a CSA link with Tower.........Stripped of its pseudohistorical aspect, it's little more than a routine story of a gold heist from a wagon by a gang commissioned by Tower. Of course, Roy gets blamed for it by Tower, and is treated as a criminal for a while, until things get straightened out at the end. Along the way, several plans to catch the leader of the gang backfire. Thus, Roy orders a gold shipment by stage to instead be transported in the minimally defended covered wagon of Gabby and his niece Calamity Jane Canary.(exuberantly played by Sally Payne), the coach acting as a decoy, to draw Morrell and gang into a shoot out. The only trouble is that Roy unwisely tells the plan to his fiancé, Louise Mason(Julie Bishop), who unwisely tells the plan to Tower, whom she naively trusts. Although the gold was stolen, as Gabby and Calamity abandoned the wagon for a rock defense, Calamity managed to kill a number of the gang before they took the gold and left. She and Gabby discovered that one of the gang(Red) was still alive. Hence, they decided to take him into the sheriff, and hopefully he would talk some truth. Unfortunately, after Tower accuses Roy of being the mastermind of the heist, Red corroborates that Roy is the man!........Near the end, Tower closes up his office in Hays City, puts his things(including the gold that Morrill handed over) in a wagon and leaves town. He says, now that the war is over, he thinks California offers him more opportunities. But, I thought Hays City was in California? Anyway, Roy convinces the sheriff that Tower may have the gold in his wagon, thus a posse goes after Tower and fights the Overland raiders, who have been following his wagon. As the raiders scatter, so does the posse, leaving Roy alone to catch Tower's wagon. He(or his stuntman) almost gets run over by the wagon in his effort to jump on the wagon.......Five well-spaced songs are sung: several by Roy when serenading Louise. Gabby and Sally(Calamity), while traveling with the gold in their wagon, sing a rousing "Up and Down the Prairie". But the most memorable song is "Tamales", sung while Sally is standing on a saloon table. The point was to attract the poker players in Tower's office, next to the saloon, to move into the saloon, so that Roy could slip in the window and rifle through Tower's papers, looking for evidence linking him to the Overland Raiders. This is when he discovered the letter from J.W. Booth.......Favorite quote(by Gabby): "This here be the first high-class entertainment seen in these parts since them actor folks put on Shakespeare's "OMELET" (or was it "Ham and Eggs"?). See it at YouTube.
Calamity Jane and an Exciting End
wes-connors4 September 2007
Roy Rogers stars as "Young Bill Hickok", saving California and its gold from wicked invaders like John Miljan (as Nicholas Tower)
against a Civil War back-story
with references to Abraham Lincoln and John Wilkes Booth. This time George "Gabby" Hayes brings along his niece, none other than Calamity Jane (well played by Sally Payne) to assist Mr. Rogers. It's an interesting team-up concept, however unlikely.
The film's highlight is its posse / stagecoach chase scene, near the film's end. Rogers and Yakima Canutt -- I assume the stuntman is the stunning Mr. Canutt -- perform well in an exciting man-under-the-stage sequence. That sequence followed one of the typical Rogers songs. Otherwise, this is nothing more than a fair Rogers western.
*** Young Bill Hickok (1940) Joseph Kane ~ Roy Rogers, George 'Gabby' Hayes, Sally Payne
The film's highlight is its posse / stagecoach chase scene, near the film's end. Rogers and Yakima Canutt -- I assume the stuntman is the stunning Mr. Canutt -- perform well in an exciting man-under-the-stage sequence. That sequence followed one of the typical Rogers songs. Otherwise, this is nothing more than a fair Rogers western.
*** Young Bill Hickok (1940) Joseph Kane ~ Roy Rogers, George 'Gabby' Hayes, Sally Payne
Kids who might have learned their history from this
bkoganbing25 July 2005
In the beginning of his career, Roy Rogers actually played characters other than people named Roy Rogers. Here he's Wild Bill Hickok who foils a dastardly plot hatched by an unnamed foreign country to detach the west coast from the union by fomenting outlaw trouble during the Civil War.
John Miljan is the villain here, performing in the best Snidely Whiplash tradition. He's only the west coast top guy, he does receive instructions from the east, Roy finds a letter addressed to Miljan signed by John Wilkes Booth. Amazing Miljan was able to keep a straight face through the whole procedure.
Actually amazing that Roy kept a straight face too. Gabby Hayes is around to lend Roy a helping hand and actress Sally Payne as Calamity Jane is the best thing here. Her performance is remarkably similar to the one given by Doris Day in another 14 years.
This film is not unusual in that it was in a tradition at the time with B Westerns to take famous names in history and create wholly fictional plots around them. That's a tradition I'm glad we've stopped.
John Miljan is the villain here, performing in the best Snidely Whiplash tradition. He's only the west coast top guy, he does receive instructions from the east, Roy finds a letter addressed to Miljan signed by John Wilkes Booth. Amazing Miljan was able to keep a straight face through the whole procedure.
Actually amazing that Roy kept a straight face too. Gabby Hayes is around to lend Roy a helping hand and actress Sally Payne as Calamity Jane is the best thing here. Her performance is remarkably similar to the one given by Doris Day in another 14 years.
This film is not unusual in that it was in a tradition at the time with B Westerns to take famous names in history and create wholly fictional plots around them. That's a tradition I'm glad we've stopped.
"Looks like it was a pretty good fight while it lasted."
classicsoncall1 December 2004
Warning: Spoilers
"Young Bill Hickok" freely uses the names of historical figures to tell a formulaic story of adventure in the closing days of the Civil War. Roy Rogers portrays Wild Bill, earning his name after he wards off a band of Morrell's Overland Raiders singlehandedly. The central story involves the shipment of gold to help finance the Union's war effort, while foreign agent Nicholas Tower (John Miljan) attempts to disrupt the enterprise, enlisting the aid of seedy John Morrell (Wally Wales as Hal Taliaferro). On the side of the good guys are crusty Gabby Whitaker (George "Gabby" Hayes) and Calamity Jane Canary (Sally Payne). Jacqueline Wells provides the love interest for Hickok, and her presence sets up some tension in the film, first as a Southern lady and Confederate sympathizer, and also as Hickok's bride to be who must take a back seat to his duty to help the Union cause.
Before the film is over, the Civil War has ended with Lee's surrender, and the news of Lincoln's assassination arrives. Tower's association with John Wilkes Booth was established midway through the film as Hickok discovers a letter signed by Booth in Tower's office. The inclusion of these historical snippets adds some interest to the proceedings, but ultimately have no affect on the main story itself.
Generally Roy Rogers portrayed himself or a character named Roy Rogers in his films, but as in this movie, he occasionally was cast as a legendary Westerner. For more of this type of fare, try "Billy the Kid Returns", "Young Buffalo Bill", or "Jesse James at Bay".
Before the film is over, the Civil War has ended with Lee's surrender, and the news of Lincoln's assassination arrives. Tower's association with John Wilkes Booth was established midway through the film as Hickok discovers a letter signed by Booth in Tower's office. The inclusion of these historical snippets adds some interest to the proceedings, but ultimately have no affect on the main story itself.
Generally Roy Rogers portrayed himself or a character named Roy Rogers in his films, but as in this movie, he occasionally was cast as a legendary Westerner. For more of this type of fare, try "Billy the Kid Returns", "Young Buffalo Bill", or "Jesse James at Bay".
B-Western Drama
StrictlyConfidential26 October 2021
Warning: Spoilers
"Young Bill Hickok" was originally released back in 1940.
Anyway - As the story goes - As the Civil War is winding to a close, a singing Bill Hickok and his trusty sidekick, Calamity Jane, are out to stop a foreign agent and his evil cohorts who are trying to steal land in the western territories.
Anyway - As the story goes - As the Civil War is winding to a close, a singing Bill Hickok and his trusty sidekick, Calamity Jane, are out to stop a foreign agent and his evil cohorts who are trying to steal land in the western territories.
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