Sky Bandits (1940)

The last Renfrew of the Mounties films starring James Newill is a fun Mounties meet sci-fi mix.

The plot concerns a gang of hijackers shooting down gold planes in the great wilds of Canada. Renfrew and his buddy Constable Kelly have been assigned to try and find out what is happening to the planes which are disappearing with no trace. Renfrew's boss suspects that the pilots are stealing the shipments and flying them over the border. Renfrew thinks that something more sinister is transpiring. Renfrew is of course right and soon he has locked horns with the gang of bad guys who have moved from using bullets to bring the planes down, to using a ray that burns out the plane's engine.

This is grand Saturday afternoon style adventure. Nominally a western without the cowboys this film is an action packed romp from start to finish as horses are often used to get from place to place. Actually the western connection is even closer with this being the second remake of Tim McCoys Ghost Patrol (Its also far superior to that earlier film).

This is a great movie with many things going for it.I like that everyone in this film is a character of some sort and manages to make an impression on you as being an individual at some point in the film. The wise cracks are funny. The action is well done. Its also great to see Dwight Frye playing the extremely tightly wound inventor of the engine stopping ray.

If the film has any real flaw is that Renfrew bursts into song about three times too often. The songs actually aren't bad, they are good in a corny sort of way, they just stop the action from moving for the two or three minutes that they are sung. Keep the remote handy and you'll be okay.

Definitely worth a bag of popcorn and an hour of your time

Danger Ahead (1940)

We're on the down slide of Renfrew films with only two more left after today.

The plot of this film this time out has a shipment of gold going missing. What we know, and Renfrew has to figure out is that the shipment was high jacked by employees of the trucking company who duped the young man driving the shipment so they could switch the load. They then put acid on the break lines when they knew the drive would take him over a treacherous road.

This time out Renfrew is "helped" by his bosses daughter who is just returned from college where she studied criminology and psychology. No one is particularly thrilled and they wish she would just go into the kitchen and make them a green apple pie.

Breezy crime story moves a long at a fast clip and it's over before you know it. To be certain it plays a little blandly when you watch it with all the other Renfrews (I did a marathon to do this series) but taken on it's own terms good little thriller.

I should warn any feminists who go to see this Renfrew is a HUGE male chauvinist pig. He will make any rational persons skin crawl with his a woman's place is in the kitchen attitude.

Murder on the Yukon (1940)

"Probe the wound Constable Kelly"

While on a semi-vacation looking for the source of counterfeit money Renfrew and Kelly discover the body of a miner in a beached canoe. The murderer had set the canoe adrift hoping that it would go over the falls hiding his misdeed, however circumstance conspired against him and soon he, and his ring of counterfeiters have to deal with the mounties looking into the murder.

This is a good solid movie. Granted it isn't much of a mystery since you know who the bad guys are from the outset, but it doesn't really matter much because the point of these films is the action and the smart mouth exchanges between Renfrew and Kelly. These are two friends who pick on each other mercilessly and there verbal sparring is always very witty and several shades cleverer than most dialog you find in these programmers. I've seen all of the Renfrew movies now and it amazes me at how much the two genuinely seem to like and care for each other, even when they are cutting each other down. Its very real.

The films action is very good with several nice fights and couple of chases. Say what you will about the series the fact that the movies take place primarily outdoors in settings you haven't seen a thousand times before is another plus. The lack of studio settings adds a nice edge to the film and makes it seem less by the numbers.

Yes, there are songs but they are not intrusive and are over almost before they start. They are also used as a way for Renfrew to pick on Kelly.

Over all this is a good solid entry in the series and definitely worth checking out if you run across it.

Yukon Flight (1940)

Once more to the frozen North...

This is a good solid program adventure film. It is not a particularly amazing one. It's possibly the blandest of all of the Renfrew of the Mounties films. It's the one film that kind of doesn't stand out as a Renfrew film (other than the singing.) Its the one film of the bunch that had I seen it first I may not have gone on to any of the others. This isn't to say it's bad, rather it's just to say it bland.

The plot of the film has some bad guys tying up one of their own and sending him aloft with a limited amount of fuel. The plan is that he'll crash and save them the trouble of killing him, and also divert suspicion away from them. Unfortunately for the baddies their victim begins to call for help on the radio and they are forced to jam the signal which brings them to the attention of the Mounties.

From their the plot gets complicated as it's revealed the bad guys are stealing the gold they are shipping and trying to cover up the thefts. A replacement pilot also arrives, a friend of Renfrew's, who is also not completely on the up and up.

How Renfrew tries to find the "missing" pilot, romances a girl and keeps his friend out of harms way is the film.

While enjoyable on it's own terms, the film is nowhere near as exciting as most of the other Renfrew films. Its a film that doesn't quite have the flair and the visual punch of some of the other entries. In all honesty it's a film that would have worked with almost any other characters in the leads since other than the uniforms the film could have been a western or even a simple crime drama with planes.

I like the film, but where I usually want to keep watching Renfrew movies once I finish one, with this one I just turned off the TV and went to bed, feeling done for the evening.

Definitely worth picking up since it is a good film. It's just the least representative of the Renfrews (even if it does have one hell of a cool fishing pole fight.)

Crashing Thru (1939)

Renfrew of the Mounties and Constable Kelly are on a riverboat in the Canadian wilderness. As they attempt to woo a young lady they meet they are unaware of plans to rob the boat of a shipment of gold secreted below deck. Worse the young lady they are attempting to make time with is involved with the plot. The Mounties are tricked into being locked in the hold of the ship and the gold is stolen. Renfrew and Kelly then have to race to recover the gold before they appear to be too big a pair of idiots.

This is a damn fine B-movie. It moves like the wind and has more than its share of double and triple crosses, not to mention plot lines. Frankly many bigger budgeted films don't have this much action and detailed plotting. This is a movie that never stops from the minute it starts until the very end. Its a nifty little action adventure film. I really like this movie a great deal. Amazingly I even like the songs in this movie. Sue me, I think they actually work well, since they are integrated into the plot.

This is one of those movies you'll want to make an effort to keep an eye out for, since its a great way to spend an hour of your time.

Alpha video and Sinister among others have it available.

Fighting Mad (1939)

Constable Kelly: I'm thinking of asking for a transfer.
Renfrew:Why?
Constable Kelly:Because nothing ever exciting happens any more.

Third film in our Renfrew series begins with two bad guys and a woman they have kidnapped wandering across the border from the US into Canada. They have a stolen 100 grand in a suitcase. They steal the car and house trailer of Benny, a man they meet on the road and drive off. It's at this point the opening exchange occurs moments before Kelly and Renfrew have to chase down the run away trailer with our heroine inside. From there it's typical Renfrew adventures as Renfrew and Kelly have to untangle the mess of stolen cars and stolen money.

This was the toughest of all the Renfrew films to track down. Until Amazon's streaming video I'd only seen it available from a collector on Ebay who was selling it on a DVD with two other Renfrew films. Why it was so difficult to find has eluded me since all of the other films are readily available from places like Sinister or Oldies.

This is one of the best Renfrew films. It's got a great characters, a great sense of place and some thrills that would have made this a great serial had the series gone that way. The songs aren't all that intrusive, and there isn't an over abundance of bad humor. Sure, Benny gets a bit bothersome, but for the most part it all works.

I really like this film. It's got all of the best things you want in a film like this, mainly a high level of action and adventure mixed with a healthy dose of suspense. It's the sort of film that would have had it been the first in the series I had seen, I would have been hooked.

This is a great little film.

Renfrew of the Royal Mounted On the Great White Trail (1938)

After a week off we continue on with our look ay all the Renfrew of the Royal Mounted films. This week we go On the Great White Trail. (I have no idea if the title is just On The Great WHite Trail or if the the title actually begins with Renfrew..., but I digress.)

While not the best in the series, it's not quite the worst either. The film is a step in the right direction, and quite charming on it's own terms.

The plot of the film has Renfrew escorting a young woman North to find her father. It seems he's gone missing and the Mounties can't reach their man in the same area so they sent Renfrew to accompany the girl. While Renfrew is on the trail it's revealed that the Mountie Renfrew is trying to contact is dead and that the girl's father has gone missing with a large sum of money.The locals believe he killed Mountie and another man. Of course things are not as they seem and Renfrew has his work cut out for him.

A much more straight forward film than the first film in the series, this film at least knows what it's about. The film's first half is closer to a straight out musical comedy with a good number of (actually quite good) songs and what seems to be a never ending series of one liners coming from Renfrew. However once the film's second half arrives things turn more serious as Renfrew sets about trying to unravel what is really going on.

I like the film, but it's not as good as the later ones in the series. Part of it is the uneven tone, part of it is the cheapness of the production (there is an over use of rear screen projections). It's an interesting bridge between the first go at the character and where it would end up a short time later when you got six films in just over under two years.

Definitely worth searching out.

(Of trivial note, this is the first appearance, fleetingly, of Constable Kelly who would become Renfrew's partner in later films.)

Renfrew Of the Royal Mounted (1937)

Today we’re starting a series which is going to run every Wednesday (except next week) to the end of the summer. We’re going to take a look at one of the most neglected and overlooked film series from the 1930’s and 1940’s, The Renfrew of the Mounties series.

Based on a series of novels the films were an odd mix of Mounties/western/mystery/ musical genres. They were the sort of thing that don’t completely fit anywhere except in the small genre of Mounties movies, and even then the films cross too many other genres to fit anywhere except with in their own series. (The novels also inspired a radio series. The 1950's TV series was simply the 8 films cut up with linking material)

The problem with the films is that they are kind of a punchline to a series of Hollywood jokes in the early 1940’s because of Renfrews tendency to burst into song for no really good reason one or twice a film. That’s all well and good but the songs stop the films dead since they more often then not, really don’t fit in the story.(Western stars like Gene Autrey or Roy Rogers more often than not seemed to fit the songs into the films more naturally) With the Renfrews the songs just happen when ever he feels like singing, usually on a long horseback ride or when wooing a girl. I’m a huge fan of the films but even I can’t justify the songs and often scan through them. On the other hand if you can forgive the songs the rest of the films are fantastic, with great action and even better mysteries. These really are super little films that you should search out. Over the next 9 weeks we’re going to look at the 8 films in the series.

The first film is simply titled Renfrew of the Royal Mounted. Some of the other films in the series begin with that and then add a qualifier after the Renfrew part.

This first time out is probably the weakest time out. Its a mixed bag film that has some of the same elements and plot points that would be reused in later films.

The plot has to do with some American counterfeiters (lead by a guy with one of the worst Italian accents you'll ever see) working out of a lodge 100 miles or so from the American border and shipping the money to the US in blocks of ice with trout frozen in them. Into the mix add an Indian and a young woman trying to find her father.

Its a hit or miss film that starts and ends with a song, has a long digression at the start concerning a picnic (time for another song) and eventually finds it's footing at which point it races to the end in a manner that is at best described as silly. Sure there is some excitement, but mostly it's a flat foot by the number action film.

I'm guessing that the series was planned and that they used this film more as an introduction to the character and set up for the series rather than an actual pilot for a potential series.

In all honesty this is the one film in the series I wouldn't bother with again. Don't get me wrong, the film isn't bad, it's just not up to the films that follow it. Films like Crashing Thru or Sky Bandits are just damn fine films on any scale, this one is just way too clunky and unsure.

The film is currently out on DVD from Alpha Video and other sources. If you skipped it it wouldn't be the end of the world.

(We'll be skipping visiting the Great White North next week as there are other things a foot. When we come back we will be On The Great White Trail.)