Grand Canyon Trail

Roy Rogers becomes entangled in murder and larceny after his friends (Andy Devine) and singing ranchers (Foy Willing and the Riders of the Purple Sage) invest $20,000 in a seeming worthless silver mine. When an old prospector who might know where the silver is located disappears, Roy suspects that the project's mining engineer (Robert Livingston) could be behind it. Seeking proof of a crime, Roy's investigation becomes even more complicated when the mine owner's secretary masquerading as his daughter (Jane Frazee) arrives in town. In a case of mistaken intentions Frazee constantly thwarts Roy's attempts to bring the bad guys to justice.

The ghost town set and dark abandoned hotel form the stage for this action oater. Roy's nine pictures with Andy Devine marked a real difference in style from earlier movies. Andy was brought in after Gabby Hayes left the series in 1946. While Andy still provided comic relief, the villains grew more ruthless and Roy sang less. Here there are only three pretty good non-action stopping tunes in the movie. Comedy of Errors inspired sequence in the spooky hotel about halfway through seems a little out of sync with the rest of the movie.

Originally filmed in "Trucolor", seemingly only the black and white prints remain on this one. Unfortunately as with a lot of the later Roy Rogers movies, this one was later chopped to bits to reduce the runtime from 67 minutes down to 54 to fit for television. Good news here is that unlike a few of Roy's other movies where the chopped footage appears lost forever, Grand Canyon Trail can still be found intact in the full length version. For Roy Rogers Fans it's worth the effort to find to 67 minute unedited format.

Pretty decent Roy Rogers flick. 6 of 10*

Grand Canyon Trail is another of the Trucolor Roy Rogers films that has shown up on DVD from a black and white print. That does not take away from the movie since black and white was so common at the time anyway.

Roy appeared kind of dumb in this one, and so did everyone else. It was customary for the lead cowboy to be able to figure out the crooks' plan and identify the leader. Roy took forever to suspect Regan, and it was only after other characters helped him that he ever learned anything. Instead of standing on guard duty and being prodded by Cookie, Foy, and the Riders of the Purple Sage, he should have already scouted around looking for clues. As much interaction as there was between the cowboys and Regan's crew someone should have suspected something sooner. There was no battle of wits. Carol Martin never figured out who wanted to hurt her and who wanted to save her until almost the end of the movie despite how obvious it was.

Roy got in a lot of fist fights in this one. More than once he got clobbered over the head and knocked out. Andy Devine bounced people around with his stomach. The sound effect of a kettle drum would have been perfect if not for the fact that the movie was not a vehicle for slapstick comedy.

The Hangman Hotel was an abandoned old building that provided an opportunity for plenty of haunted house stick comedy. There were scenes of characters chasing from one room to the other with fights throughout the building and crossed paths between the good guys and bad guys. Seeing Andy Devine scream once is funny, but there can be too much of a good thing. The hotel was critical to the story as it was the site where a murder victim was discovered, but the hotel was over-used.

Seeing Robert Livingston go from the leader of the Three Mesquiteers to playing a villain is disheartening. Above all he was an actor who played the part of Regan perfectly. Watching past heroes playing villains or small roles always comes across as sad because few of them ever went back to the glory of their previous films.

Overall the story was good, but it I think the characters could have been developed a little better. Not a bad movie, Grand Canyon Trail is a lull in the Roy Rogers series despite having a great cast and, for some, Trucolor.

Is there silver in sintown or not? Half the folks think its a swindle and the other half thinks there's still treasure down there. Carol (jane frazee) is willing to take a chance and get investors in on the deal. She gets off on the wrong foot with roy rogers (and his horse trigger)... she fires him, not realizing he's not even an employee. Regular sidekick andy devine is in here as cookie. Turns out regan, one of the hired hands, wants to keep the silver for himself. This has all the usual fistfights, the horse chases. The mining schemes from republic pictures. Throw in a haunted house too! It's silly, but it's roy rogers in his prime. Directed by bill witney. Story by gerald geraghty. He worked on 19 films with roy rogers! Then died young at age 47.

Roy Rogers and company try to bring "Sintown" back to life - it's a ghost town which may go boom if silver mining is successful. Andy Devine (as "Cookie") slapsticks around. Jane Frazee (as Carol) loses a piece of her bitches to Mr. Rogers' sharp leer. Foy Willing and the Riders of the Purple Sage stand-in (or, is that sing-in?) for the A.W.O.L. Bob Nolan and the Sons of the Pioneers. James Finlayson (from the Laurel and Hardy films) adds to the "slapstick" look of "Grand Canyon Trail". A loose floor board delivers the winning comedy performance. Mr. Devine's mule kicks its heels. There are energetic human performances, too - but, the material isn't Grand.

** Grand Canyon Trail (1948) William Witney ~ Roy Rogers, Jane Frazee, Andy Devine

While it's probably just average among the many Roy Rogers features, there's enough action in "Grand Canyon Trail" to make it worth watching. The story is pretty thin this time. What there is of it has Roy, Andy Devine, and a spunky but sometimes misguided heroine battling the bad guys over a silver mine, while also having to deal with the usual dull-witted sheriff (played by an old silent comedy favorite, James Finlayson). There's also a supposedly haunted hotel that is mainly played for a few laughs, most of them at the expense of Divine's character. It does not always fit together as well as it could have, but there is plenty of action, plus a couple of songs, and it has pretty much everything you would expect from one of Rogers's movies.