Hollywood Round-Up

Columbia seemed intent on making B-films about westerns being shot in Hollywood and the behind-the-scenes glimpses throughout the story that are supposed to be a point of interest.

Trouble is the script offers nothing in the way of real entertainment. BUCK JONES is a cowboy doubling for big western star GRANT WITHERS, a conceited hunk of muscle in love with HELEN TWELVETREES. Despite a name that makes you blink, Twelvetrees is quite forgettable as an actress and the rest of the cast is sub-par in that department too.

Little DICKIE JONES (he was the voice for "Pinocchio" in the Disney classic), plays a wannabee cowboy who helps get Buck Jones out of a jam when he's mistakenly thought to be part of a bank robbery. Everything is straightened out for the last reel, but by this time most viewers will find the whole tale mighty predictable. The bit with the airplane and the dramatic attempt to get the gangsters from flying off in their plane is about as far-fetched as anything else in the story.

I reckon you can skip this one without missing anything.

One of three films made by Columbia circa 1936-37 based on behind-the-scenes film making with a "western" setting ("The Cowboy Star", "Hollywood Roundup" and "It Happened in Hollywood"), plus RKO weighed in the same year with George O'Brien's "Hollywood Cowboy." It had been done before, RKO's 1933 "Scarlet River", and would be done again, "Shooting High" from 20th Century-Fox and Republic's "Bells of Rosarita", among others with a western setting, but this Coronet production with Buck Jones may well be the best of the lot as it devotes more footage to actual film-making both on studio sets and locations. One out-of-the norm plot incident has the studio head Lew Wallace offering a job to a fading star Carol Stevens, with a semi-apology for casting her in what he calls an "outdoor special" and she calls a "horse opry", and this scene in a B-western leaves no doubt that the B-western and it people were near the bottom of Hollywood's pecking order. The stereotypes are there, with Shemp Howard's over-zealous "assistant director" (who does calm down and gets more real when he loses his whistle), the ego-ridden "star" in Grant Drexel, and the deserving-to-be-the-star relegated to stand-in and stunts Buck Kennedy, but the remaining crew and player roles are realistic (especially the real stuntmen playing stuntmen). Buck Kennedy is the stand-in and double for star Grant Drexel and is fired when he has a fight with the bullying Drexel over Drexel's treatment of leading lady Carol Stephens. The movie company is on location, and a group of gangsters led by Eddie Kane and Lester Dorr, posing as another movie company, come to the location town and talk the banker into letting them film a fake holdup in his bank, but the holdup is real and the out-of-work Buck, whom they hire as the fall guy to cover their getaway, is left holding the bag and jailed by town sheriff Slim Whitaker. Things get worse for Buck before they get better. A mid-point sequence has hotel clerk George R. Beranger, who dreams of being a western star, performing a twittering, ballet-slippering audition for the checking-in film company by quoting lines from a western and asking them to identify the film. Shemp Howard guesses "Little Women."

There is a rather strange scene early on in this picture.the character played by Helen Twelvetrees goes to see the studio boss initially to complain that she has not made a picture for the studio in over a year.In reality Twelvetrees only made this film in 1937.The boss then admits that she had had 4 box office failures in a row and therefore he wanted her to go into this western.In reality Twelvetrees was virtually at the end of her film career with only a couple more films to go.Bearing in mind of course that between 1929 and 1936 she had appeared in around 30 films.So one can only assume that someone at Columbia had a malicious sense of humour or was paying off for past insults.Based on her performance in this film it is difficult to understand why her star slipped so quickly.She would probably be completely unknown now if it weren't for her unusual surname.This is an entertaining film with the bonus of a behind the scenes look at how B Westerns were made in the 30s.Well worth a look.

"Hollywood Round-Up" is a supposed look behind the scenes at the making of a cheap B-western. It's a nice change of pace for the genre and Buck Jones is, as usual, very good in the lead.

When the film begins, Buck Kennedy (Jones) is a movie stand-in who does all the dirty scenes for the star, Grant Drexel (Grant Withers). Despite looking similar, Drexel is the opposite of the nice-guy Kenney. Drexel is obnoxious, a bully and a liar and makes Kennedy's life miserable throughout this movie. Drexel also cannot keep his filthy paws off his leading lady, Carol Stevens (Helen Twelvetrees)...a once leading lady whose career has turned downward...and so she's forced to appear in the so-called 'horse operas'.

Late in the film, Drexel gets Kennedy fired and a group of crooks convince Kennedy that they are filmmakers. But, as they rob the bank, it is NOT being filmed...it's real! And, Buck is left holding the bag. in a twist much like a B-western of the era, Buck soon breaks out of prison to catch the baddies himself...and yet Drexel steps in and acts as if HE is the hero! Is there anything anyone can do to prove Buck Kennedy is a hero and Drexel is a real zero?!

This is a very interesting B-western because I've seen at least a thousand and they mostly consist of about 3 or 4 plots...but this one is much more unique and enjoyable. I did NOT like the whole fake filmmakers portion because it simply didn't make sense. But the rest of the film was just great--very enjoyable and it was nice to see Drexel get his!

By the way, a couple interesting things about the movie are the casting of Twelvetrees and Dickie Jones (who played her brother). Twelvetrees played a once leading actress forced to be in a B-western--and that is EXACTLY what happened with this film. Soon she'd be out of movies completely and, sadly, a decade later she'd kill herself...presumably, in part, due to her career. Also, Jones is interesting because just a few years later he'd star as the leading voice actor in "Pinocchio".