The Renegade Ranger

While the plot idea of having an evil rich boss trying to control everything out west is one of the most common themes in westerns, "The Renegade Ranger" manages to take a worn cliché of a plot and make it mildly interesting. Mind you, this is a B-movie and to really appreciate it, you should remember that it has a very modest budget and modest cast--and they did pretty well with these constraints.

The film stars a big western star of the day, the all but forgotten George O'Brien as well as an up and coming star, Tim Holt. It also offers a very rare chance to see a very young Rita Hayworth before she was reinvented by Columbia Pictures boss Harry Cohn. What I mean by this is that Cohn envisioned her as a big star and had her makeup, hair and even hairline altered to create a much more glamorous image. Here in "The Renegade Ranger", although she's pretty, she isn't yet the stunner she'd soon become.

As far as the plot goes, the only way this really differs from the 101231092312 other westerns with evil boss-men is that the leader of the opposition is a lady (Hayworth) and an ex-Ranger (Holt) is working both sides of the fence during the picture! So why, if it's so familiar do I recommend it? Well, the acting. The three leads were a good bit better than usual for such a film and they managed to carry it off--making the acting seem more natural than usual. Worth your time.

Renegade Ranger, The (1938)

* 1/2 (out of 4)

A couple Texas Rangers (George O'Brien/Tim Holt) are hired to bring in a ranch owner (Rita Hayworth) who is raging a battle against the government over land stolen from ranchers. She's painted as a murderer but really she's just acting as a Robin Hood type. Even at 60-minutes this RKO Western is deadly dull without any excitement. There are your typical fist fights and shoot outs but all of them are deadly dry as is the relationship between O'Brien and Hayworth. The only saving grace is Holt in his supporting role and Hayworth is somewhat interesting.

Too bad that George O'Brien is largely forgotten among front row kids. He may not have the charisma nor singing voice of a Rogers or LaRue, but his burly physique is perfect for action roles. Here it's really Holt who has the eye-catching charisma. No wonder he was soon featured in his own series. Of course, the chief attraction is Rita Hayworth before her career took off. She's certainly a striking presence, but for curiosity seekers like myself, it's hard to tell with that hat on whether this was before or after her hairline was raised. It certainly made a difference in appearance. Check out Charlie Chan in Egypt (1935) for a revealing glimpse.

The programmer itself has a couple of good plot twists— a tricky ex-Ranger Holt with a wobbly moral compass, and a misled Ranger O'Brien who chases after the wrong gang. The plot's also driven by a conflict between Latinos whose land ownership derives from Spanish land grants and a ruthless frontier land-grabber who wants to scheme the land away from them. Conflict over Spanish land authority is an interesting historical twist I never really thought about. On the other hand, I've got to agree with another reviewer who finds the action scenes foreshortened and not very exciting. Anyway, it's the thoughtful storyline, along with Holt and Hayworth that make this oater worth sticking around for.

A "6" on the matinée scale

THE RENEGADE RANGER (1938) is a 59-minute B-western about how white expansion in Texas forced out Spanish and Mexican landowners. Rita Hayworth plays Judith Alvarez, daughter of a Spanish landowner whose land has been taken by white landgrabbers working with a corrupt sheriff. She leads a band of Spaniards and Mexicans in making attacks on the ranchers who've taken their land illegally. Tim Holt plays a frustrated ex-Texas Ranger who wholeheartedly joins Alvarez' band and helps in their efforts. He even acquires a Mexican girlfriend (Cecilia Callejo). George O'Brien plays Holt's Texas Ranger buddy who joins the gang himself, working undercover, on assignment to capture and arrest Miss Alvarez. Holt is torn between loyalty to Alvarez and her cause and his friendship with O'Brien. O'Brien gradually falls in love with Judith himself, which complicates matters even further.

This is a fascinating movie on multiple counts, not least of which is the presence of Rita Hayworth in the role of an Hispanic crusader against white depredations. Hayworth was of Spanish descent herself (real name: Margarita Carmen Cansino) and her band is cast entirely with actual Mexican actors. (The more B-westerns I see, the more I realize that appropriate ethnic casting of Mexican and Indian roles was the rule and not the exception in this genre.) Hayworth was all of 19 when she made this and she was already a great beauty, adorned in stylish western fashions that bring out the best in her. It's easy to see the roots of the glamorous movie star and pinup queen she'd become in a few short years.

Also, the whites, except for the two male stars, O'Brien and Holt, are generally bad guys here and the taking of land from its original owners is condemned. (No word though, about the souls who occupied the land before the Spaniards arrived, but that's another story.) I've seen another western with this plot recently, "California Frontier" (1938), starring Buck Jones as an army officer working undercover in California to thwart white landgrabbers taking land from Mexicans. Rita herself had co-starred in a similar western in 1936, REBELLION. I imagine that further exploration into the vast uncharted territory of the B-western will yield additional gems.

This is a film basically about crooked land trickery in the old west, specifically Texas in this case. Such activities historically were well documented for a time along the Rio Grande on the far south Texas border rather than so specifically the Pecos River area of Texas which was mostly just empty desert, but do form a footnote in the five hundred year history of the Spanish Colonial New World and its later ex-colonies the Republic of Mexico and Republic of Texas (later to merge into the U.S. and become a State). The colorful border atmosphere is somewhat captured in this otherwise routine western movie.

Established star and real-life American hero George O'Brien is strong in the lead role and young buck Tim Holt is an unpredictable and mercurial kid Ranger and they are both fine in their roles, ordinary as the roles may be. Veteran actors do good work in support.

But now the reason for my review of this movie: stunning young Rita Hayworth. Her beauty and screen presence jump off the screen. She has obviously got "it". Her acting is forceful and her wardrobe ranges from pretty dresses to riding clothes that do not (or cannot) constrain certain parts of her upper torso. As a side note, I could mention that she does an impressive amount of her own horsemanship in this film. And if I was a rider in her vigilante justice group I would surely follow her to hell and back. Hayworth is a young actress giving a good performance here that sets her up for the launch of her soon to be mega-stardom, and deservedly so.

OK, its only an ordinary b-western. But the film's three starring performers elevate it well above what it otherwise would be.