Boys' Ranch

MGM, the same studio that bought you the more critically acclaimed Boystown, produced this film about a ballplayer, James Craig, who takes a job as superintendent of a ranch where boys in legal trouble go to get straightened out before reaching the age of majority.

Of course James Craig is hardly Spencer Tracy, but he shouldn't be blamed for that. He turns in a nice easy to take performance as the secular Father Flanagan of the film.

Of course the irredeemable bad kid, the role Mickey Rooney had, is played with a little more menace by Skip Homeier. Homeier had made a great screen debut as the little boy Nazi in Tomorrow the World. In fact, he's quite an operator here, so much so that the situation that does redeem him in the end does not quite ring true.

Still it's a nice family picture and with Boys Ranch still operating, surprising it's not shown more often.