Sadly Over-hyped

Plot so thin, it passes unnoticed.

Excellent but underrated film

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

1943's "Silver Spurs" was an above average Roy Rogers vehicle, then at the peak of his fame, boasting a higher budget, more ambitious script, and better supporting cast than the usual Republic players. Making his debut for Herbert J. Yates was scene stealing character star John Carradine, clearly in his element as Lucky Miller, villainous proprietor of the Frontier Lodge, who schemes to obtain an oil well by orchestrating a wedding for his drunkard accomplice Jerry Johnson (Jerome Cowan) to a mail order bride (Phyllis Brooks), since Miller can only purchase the ranch property from a widow. Rogers is the ranch foreman, cleverly framed by Miller for the murder of Johnson right after the two had a falling out. Approximately 14-15 minutes are missing from its original 68 minute running time, mostly deleted songs, yet the actual wedding ceremony featuring Byron Foulger's Justice of the Peace is nowhere to be seen either. Roy's horse Trigger has a couple of impressive stunts, while sidekick Smiley Burnette once again trots out Frog Millhouse, a character he played nearly 50 times over 10 years. The dapper Carradine occasionally looks out of place, never seen wearing anything but a suit and tie (even atop a horse!), but his presence spices up the proceedings, making this one of the star's best remembered films.

Silver Spurs has the kind of plot situation more involved in one of those Philo Vance murder mysteries than with a Roy Rogers western. The fact that we see all the villainous machinations of John Carradine and his henchmen out in the open robs it of being a mystery. But Silver Spurs still rates as a pretty good Roy Rogers western.For a plot this is interesting and unusual for a western. It involves playboy Jerome Cowan who among other things has a ranch that Roy Rogers is the foreman of. The people in the area want him to give the railroad a right of way, but Cowan is too busy partying to pay any attention to business.Apparently Jerome's dad knew what an idiot he was raising so the terms of his will are that the ranch can't be sold, but if he dies his widow can. So Carradine who owns the local gambling house arranges for a mail order bride for the well known playboy. Which perks the interest of sob sister reporter Phyllis Brooks and she comes west and marries the guy to see what the story is. Little did Phyllis suspect.The emphasis is on action and plot rather than Roy's singing. Still he gets to do a couple of standards the great Al Jolson song Back In Your Own Backyard and Tumbling Tumbleweeds which was written by Sons Of The Pioneers head Bob Nolan. And Roy gets as a sidekick Smiley Burnette who takes his Frog Millhouse character from those Gene Autry flicks where he sidekicked with Gene before Autry went into the service.Burnette even gets a love interest himself with Joyce Compton who is the sidekick of Phyllis Brooks. All in all a pretty good western for Roy Rogers.

Silver Spurs (1943) ** 1/2 (out of 4) This "B" Western from Republic probably won't appeal to too many people today but it's your typical Roy Rogers vehicle, which gets some added spice with one of the bad guys being played by John Carradine. In the film Roy is accused of killing his boss but of course he's innocent so he must break free from the Sheriff and try to clear his name. Along the way a female reporter is on the case and discovers that the murder might have something to do with a valuable piece of property. Apparently there are quite a few different versions of this film available from countless public domain companies. I had this film on three different sets and the running time varied on each of them. I went ahead and watched the longest (just at 60-minutes) but from the reviews I've read it appears the shorter versions are missing some of the music from Roy Rogers and the Son of the Pioneers. Overall this is a fairly entertaining Western as long as you don't go into it expecting something like John Ford would give you. At this point I really haven't seen too many films from Rogers but I certainly enjoyed his performance here and look forward to other movies. I thought the story was your typical stuff that had been going around Hollywood since the silent era and we even had some 30s stuff thrown in like the subplot with the reporter. For the most part the story is decent enough to keep you entertained but I'm sure a lot of this has to do with the short running time. Rogers was pretty charming in his role as he has to flirt with the ladies while trying to track down the bad guys. I guess it goes without saying but Rogers was at ease in the role and was quite believable during the action pieces. I'm sure the events going on in Carradine's personal life caused him to take this part and to be honest there's not too much he or anyone else could have done with it. It's clear the studio didn't take advantage of having him in the picture by making the part bigger because it really doesn't stand out and in fact any actor could have done it. Carradine is decent in the part but it's just strange seeing even him in something like this. Trigger, the horse, appears and gets to do a couple stunts as well. The action in the film is pretty good including one scene where a car goes off a cliff and Roy has to use his rope to get to the bottom.

This Roy Rogers film sure seemed to have less singing than usual. When I checked IMDb it said the film had been trimmed (probably for TV) and I assume that one way they shortened it was by removing some of the songs. Well, I do like Rogers' pleasant voice, but less songs means more story and more action--something that seemed to make this film flow better than other Rogers film I have seen.Roy works for a drunkard who is also a full-time idiot and jerk (wow--the trifecta!). His willingness to put up with this guy is apparently out of some misguided loyalty to the guy's dead father as well as his trying to arrange for some right of way for the railroad. Regardless, an evil baddie (John Carradine) is out to kill the drunk, steal his land and frame Roy! So Roy does what any handsome western hero would do when his boss is killed--run away from the law and solve the murder himself.Instead of Gabby Hays (my favorite Rogers sidekick), this one has the generally ineffectual and rather addle-brained Smiley Burnett. Despite Burnett's 'help', Roy is able to eventually solve the crime and clear his good name.Due to good pacing, a reasonably original story (minus the cliché of running off to solve the crime himself) and plenty of nice action (along with one or two insane stunts) make this worth seeing--particularly if you like series westerns.