Heart of the Rio Grande ** (1942, Gene Autry, Smiley Burnette, Fay McKenzie, Sarah Padden, Edith Fellows, Jean Porter) – Classic Movie Review 8869

Director William Morgan’s comedy action adventure Heart of the Rio Grande (1942) is a sunny, mildly entertaining Gene Autry movie, with much music and comedy and little action. Sarah Padden plays ranch owner Skipper Forbes, who hires Autry as her new foreman, allowing old foreman Hap Callahan (William Haade) to stay on as ranch hand.

Naturally Callahan resents Autry and his plans to start a dude ranch, leading to a punch-up and Callahan’s dismissal and plotting revenge. A girls’ school arrives at the new dude ranch for the summer and their teacher Alice Bennett (Fay McKenzie) becomes Autry’s love (cue a song) and his sidekick Frog’s (Smiley Burnett) unrequited love.

The standout student is Connie Lane (Edith Fellows), a millionaire businessman’s spoiled daughter, who at first causes trouble. Jean Porter plays another student called Pudge, and soon becomes fat young Tadpole (Joe Strauch Jr)’s first crush.

Heart of the Rio Grande is all very simple and basic, a throwaway product of a by-gone era. But is is busy and energetic, and vivaciously played stuff, and quite pleasant enough as a low-cost black and white Republic Pictures B-movie.

The screenplay is by Lillie Hayward and Winston Miller, based on story a Newlin B Wildes.

Fay McKenzie died at 101 on 16 April 2019.

American actress and singer Fay McKenzie (born 19 February 1918) died at 101 on 16 April 2019. She starred in silent films as a child, and then sound films as an adult, but is best known for her leading roles opposite Gene Autry in five early 1940s Westerns. She is also known for her five collaborations with director Blake Edwards, including Breakfast at Tiffany’s, Experiment in Terror, The Party and S.O.B.

Her screenwriter husband Tom Waldman worked on the screenplays for Edwards’s High Time (1960), The Party (1968) and Trail of the Pink Panther (1982).

© Derek Winnert 2019 Classic Movie Review 8869

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