Wonderful character development!

It is not only a funny movie, but it allows a great amount of joy for anyone who watches it.

The tone of this movie is interesting -- the stakes are both dramatic and high, but it's balanced with a lot of fun, tongue and cheek dialogue.

It is a whirlwind of delight --- attractive actors, stunning couture, spectacular sets and outrageous parties.

"Streets of Ghost Town" is another in the Durango Kid series starring Charles Starrett and Smiley Burnette. If you haven't seen earlier entries in the series, you might enjoy this one. It's told mostly in flashbacks and uses generous amounts of stock footage in the telling. Much of the back story including a land rush, cattle stampede and horse stampede come from earlier films.Steve Woods (Starrett), Smiley and the Sheriff of Dusty Creek (Stanley Andrews) arrive in the ghost town of Shadeville in search of a lost treasure hidden by outlaw Bill Donner (George Chesebro) years before. Outlaw Bart Selby (Frank Fenton) whom Donner and his partner Wicks (John Cason) had doubled crossed also seeks the loot. Donner after years running with a gang which included Bob Kortman , is arrested and sent to prison.Donner escapes prison but is captured by Selby's gang and is blinded. He then goes into hiding in the ghost town with only his young grandson Tommy (Don Reynolds) to help him. Grand Daughter Doris (Mary Ellen Kay) also has an interest. Tommy makes an important discovery. Selby arrives on the scene as does Durango and.......................................................................It was nice to see grizzled old veteran George Chesebro given a major role for a change even though most of his part was in the stock footage. Fenton didn't make a very convincing gang leader. Mary Ellen Kay was totally wasted in her brief role. Starrett has little to do except story tell and show up as Durango at the end to round up the bad guys. The Colorado Rangers singing group provide the entertainment along with Smiley.Did you ever wonder how Smiley never knew Durango's identity even though he was always close pal with the Steve character?

... and that's the case here. The story is told mainly in flashback as The Durango Kid (Charles Starrett) recounts the tale of a stolen stash of gold known only to blind outlaw Bill Donner and a child in which Donner confided, but is desired by outlaw Frank Fenton. The "ghost town" was once a thriving place, but Fenton ran everyone out of town by terrorizing the settlers, all so he could have the place to himself and eventually find the gold. There are lots of good action shots in this film mainly because about two thirds of the film is stock footage from past Durango Kid westerns. Only the ending shots and the scenes where Durango is recounting the tale are new footage. There are some macabre elements here you don't normally see in these westerns, such as outlaw Bill Donner locking his partners in the hidden vault with the gold and leaving them, now two of the richest men in the world, to die in a grave of gold. In another scene Donner is captured by Fenton's gang and then returns blinded. It is not clear whether Donner blinded himself so he could not be forced to divulge the location of the loot, or if Fenton did it out of meanness, and in this case, stupidity. If you haven't seen the past Durango Kid westerns and therefore recognize all of the stock footage, and you like westerns in general, you should like this one.

By the time "Streets of Ghost Town" came out, Columbia was using more and more stock footage to keep expenses down, and it's quite evident here, particularly in those scenes with the voice over narration by Charles Starrett. The film also chews up a lot of time with endless back and forth riders on horseback and it's share of stampeding cattle. But for young matinée movie fans of the 1940's and '50's, this was the kind of action that kept all the young fans happy, both boys AND girls.I was intrigued by the location of the story, near Border Plain and the wild country of The Spur. That sounds really cool, but I wonder if there really is such a place; Google gives you over a million hits, and I don't have that much time. With the ghost town theme, I thought the picture would get a little more mileage out of Smiley Burnette reacting to ghostly phenomena, but there was only that single Donner appearance in the window, and not too scary at that.As for Smiley, he only gets to do one musical number in the picture instead of his usual three or four, in fact the first is done by Ozie Waters and his Colorado Rangers. Then there's that curiously named boy actor, Little Brown Jug as Tommy Donner; I really need to get to the bottom of that nickname. His real name, Don Reynolds is credited here, but I've seen pictures that list him only as Little Brown Jug.If you're a big time Durango Kid fan, you might think you've seen this picture before, there was a 1946 Durango film titled "Landrush", also taking place in 'The Spur', and having similar elements, right down to digging trenches to fight the fires set by the villains. My guess is that if you watched them back to back, the land rush scenes from the earlier film are recycled here. As far as other 'B' Westerns offering a 'ghostly' theme, I would recommend Lash Larue's "Ghost Town Renegades" from 1947, where the comedy antics are handled by Fuzzy St. John.

I found it interesting that this film was not original, but used stock footage from previous westerns: "Gunning For Vengeance" and "Landrush." I always suspected that a lot of the shooting and chasing in westerns appeared the same, but I never realized that they actually used the same film. Roger Corman would be proud.I also found it interesting in this particular western the use of the protection racket by the outlaws. Agasin, something I had never seen previously. Using stampeding horses or cows to intimidate and collect protection money. Cowboy Mafia? The cowboys here, including the Durtango Kid, really need to take some shooting lessons. Bullets were flying all over the place and no one got shot./ The only time anyone did get shot was at point blank range from 3-4 feet. Interesting.