U.S. Marshals Nevada Jack McKenzie (Johnny Mack Brown) and Sandy Hopkins (Raymond Hatton) are sent to investigate a series of bank robberies and stage holdups, arriving just as the latest crime occurs. As is common with this series, they both go undercover: Nevada follows the escaping crooks and tries to get in with the gang, …
Monogram Monday: King of the Zombies (1941)
The comic contribution of Mantan Moreland is the highlight of this otherwise rather lackluster Monogram horror movie. In it, a plane driven off course in a storm makes a crash landing on a small Caribbean island. There, the fliers — Mac (Dick Purcell), Bill (John Archer), and Bill’s valet, Jeff (Mantan Moreland) — find shelter …
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Monogram Monday: In Fast Company (1946)
The Bowery Boys (Leo Gorcey, Huntz Hall, and the rest) square off against a strong-arm taxi company on behalf of the independent hack drivers in this early series entry that benefits from a supporting cast including Jane Randolph and Douglas Fowley. The boys’ usual antics provide action and humor in a movie that zips right …
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Monogram Monday: Yukon Manhunt (1951)
Kirby Grant, best known as TV’s Sky King, starred as a Mountie in a series of 10 movies for Monogram Pictures that prominently featured Chinook, a dog who later played White Shadow in Disney’s Corky and White Shadow (and my dog’s favorite actor — the only one for which she pays attention to the screen). …
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Monogram Monday: The Mysterious Mr. Wong (1934)
A brash reporter (Wallace Ford) investigates a series of murders in Chinatown that are in some way connected with the fabled 12 Coins of Confucius, while also doing some wooing. Bela Lugosi has top billing as the titular criminal, who also masquerades as a simple spice dealer. The plot is rather muddled, and Ford (and …
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Monogram Monday: Live Wires (1946)
After six years as the East Side Kids (for a total of 22 movies), several of the actors who started out in Dead End moved over to the long-running Bowery Boys series. Live Wires was the first of 48 Bowery Boys movies made through 1958, and like many of the other entries, it provides a …
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Monogram Monday: The Texas Kid (1943)
A surprising ending adds interest to this Johnny Mack Brown feature, one of his Nevada Jack McKenzie series costarring Raymond Hatton as U.S. Marshal Sandy Hopkins. Much of the focus in the picture is on the title character (played by Marshall Reed), a man involved with a gang of outlaws who sets out to cross …
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Monogram Monday: Oklahoma Blues (1948)
Singing cowboy Jimmy Wakely is thought to be a gun-slinging desperado, the Melody Kid, thanks to tales told by pal Cannonball (Dub Taylor). Wakely is persuaded to fill in for an injured lawman to put an end to a crime wave and thus secure a town’s bid to become the county seat. Matters get even …
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Monogram Monday: Hidden Valley (1932)
Likeable cowboy star Bob Steele is the lead in this unusual western, directed by his father, Robert N. Bradbury. It’s a lost-race tale in which Bob Harding (Steele) is framed for the murder of an archaeologist who possesses a map to the valley of the title, which supposedly contains gold, silver, turquoise, and opals. Harding …
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Monogram Monday: Six-Gun Serenade (1947)
A wandering cowpoke (Jimmy Wakely) who rescues an orphaned calf finds himself arrested and eventually sent on a work detail to a ranch whose owner (Kay Morley) has been facing difficulties from rustlers, sufficient to make it likely that she will lose her ranch in foreclosure. Jimmy and his fellow prisoners (including Lee “Lasses” White) …
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