Customer Reviews

Winners of the West

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is not exactly a winner, though I do like Dick Foran; to me, he was a better actor than either Autry or Rogers. He was almost the first singing cowboy, beaten to the screen by only about a month by Gene Autry. He tends to under-act in a very self-assured way. Anne Nagel is attractive and convincing in her role, as you see her slowly turn from dislike of the hero to admiration to love. Harry Woods ("Rustlers of Red Dog") is one of the all-time great Western bad guys, and he's at his best here. He reminds me of Roy Barcroft, which is appropriate because Barcroft has a minor part in this one--he once said he learned the most about acting by watching Harry Woods. Tom Fadden is likeable as Tex Houston, Jeff Ramsey's sidekick.

Unfortunately, the serial isn't much in spite of the good acting at the top. The plot is derivative: The local outlaw leader doesn't want the railroad coming through to ruin his little empire, so he and his bandits incite the local Indians to stop it. That's been done before, and better. The chapter endings are typical Universal half-baked cliffhangers, including at least one stupid cheat: In Chapter Two a train is coming around a curve atop a high cliff with the hero on board, and it hits a broken track and careens into the canyon. Just before that, he jumps off the train onto level ground that didn't exist. And the cliffhanger that ends Chapter Twelve is lifted straight out of "The Phantom Rider," with close-ups of Dick Foran substituted for Buck Jones. Pretty shabby.

VCI Entertainment and Universal Pictures present "Winners of the West" (1940) (digitally remastered), 13 Chapters of vintage serial loaded with action sequences featuring heroes and villains Dick Foran, James Craig, Harry Woods, Roy Barcroft and Charles Stevens...there is a great deal of entertainment here for the cliffhanger fans out there...large scale Indian attacks and constant raids by badmen trying to steal locomotives from the railroad...loaded with non-stop action and boasts a cast of thousands...as always life threatening chapters with overturned wagons and railroad explosions

Under director's Ford Beebe and Ray Taylor with screenplay by Charles R. Condon, George H Plympton and Basil Dickey...the cast include Dick Foran (Jeff Ramsay), Anne Nagel (Claire Hartford ), James Craig (Jim Jackson), Tom Fadden (Tex Houston ), Harry Woods (King Carter - boss & leader), Charles Stevens (Snakeye ), Roy Barcroft (Logan - henchman), Edmund Cobb (Maddox - henchman), Edward Keane (John Hartford)...another great serial provided by Universal Pictures during their heyday in the early '40s...John Hartford is in charge of building a railroad heading west and to stop him from going through his town of Blackhawk is King Carter...his henchman Snakeye is stirring up the Indians into attacking the railroad crew. in every direction...now enters our hero Jeff Ramsay and his sidekicks Tex Houston and Jim Jackson who head the crew and keep them out of Harem's way...can Carter along with Snakeye stir up the local Indian tribe under Chief War Eagle succeed in constantly raiding the railroad camp and stop the railroad from coming through...will Claire Hartford be kidnapped and possibly killed....can the trio Foran, Fadden and Craig fight their way clear of Carter's gang of thugs and save the save the day...don't miss one single episode that will keep you thrilled until the next chapter the following week.

B-Western fans keep a look out for old time players the meanest looking gang of bad guys from the stables of Hollywood with their leader Harry Woods (the best of the "B" Western heavies) and the grandson of Geronimo, famous Apache Chief actor Charlie Stevens, Trevor Bardette, Edmond Cobb, Roy Barcroft, Edgar Edwards, Bud Osborne and Tom London as henchmen...and briefly you can catch a glance of Bob Kortman, Ed Cassidy, Kermit Maynard, Bud Osborne and Iron Eyes Cody...seems almost like a class reunion of B-Western alumni...can't make a good Western without those veterans.

CHAPTER TITLES:
Disc One (1)
1. Redskins Ride Again
2. The Wreck at Red River Gorge
3. The Bridge of Disaster
4. Trapped by Redskins
5. Death Strikes the Trail
6. A Leap for Life
7. Thundering Terror
8. The Flaming Arsenal

SPECIAL FEATURES:
BIOS:
Dick Foran
Anne Nagel
Ford Beebe (Director)
Ray Taylor (Director)

CliffHanger Promo:
ADVENTURES OF THE FLYING CADETS (Bobby Jordan)
BUCK ROGERS (Buster Crabbe)
DICK TRACY & G Men (Ralph Byrd)
FLASH GORDON CONQUERS THE UNIVERSE (Buster Crabbe)
JUNGLE GIRL (Edgar Rice Burroughs)
JUNGLE JIM (Grant Withers & Raymond Hatton)
MANDRAKE THE MAGICIAN
THE MIRACLE RIDER (Tom Mix & Tony Jr)
THE PHANTOM (Tom Tyler)
SECRET AGENT X-9 (Lloyd Bridges)
ZANE GREYS 'KING OF THE ROYAL MOUNTED" (Allan Rocky Lane)
ZORRO'S CLIFFHANGER COLLECTION (John Carroll/Reed Hadley/George J. Lewis/Linda Stirling)

CHAPTER TITLES
Disc Two (2)
9. Sacrificed by Savages
10.Under Crashing Timbers
11.Bullets in the Dark
12.The Battle of Blackhawk
13.Barricades Blasted

EXTRAS!
Winners of the West (Dick Foran)
Adventures of Red Ryder (Don "Red" Barry)
Riders of Death Valley (Dick Foran)
Royal Mounted Rides Again (Milburn Stone)

Own them now on DVD....if you crave action, drama and plenty of adventure then this is the place for all of the above...if you enjoyed this serial check out the thrilling Johnny Mack Brown serial "Fighting with Kit Carson" (1933) from VCI Entertainment...also the latest Bobby J. Copeland's book on "Johnny Mack Brown: Up Close & Personal" is chuck full of answers to all the questions his fans had from early on...and the complete account of "Roy Barcroft:King of the Badmen", which is the title of Bobby J. Copeland's book on the life and times of "Republic Pictures Number One Villain" both books published by Empire Publishing and available on Amazon.

Great job by VCI Entertainment for releasing the digital transfere with a clean, clear and crisp print...looking forward to more of the same from the '40s vintage...order your copy now from Amazon or VCI Entertainment, stay tuned once again with a top notch serial from VCI...just the way we like 'em!

Total Time: 247 mins on 2 DVD's ~ VCI Entertainment 8416 ~ (12/28/2004)

I'm less impressed with Dick Foran than is one of the other reviewers, but James Craig, Tom Fadden, and Anne Nagel among the good guys, and Harry Woods, Trevor Bardette, and, especially, Charles Stevens on the side of the villains, more than make up for Foran's occasionally forced line-readings. A good actor and an excellent rider, Stevens would have made a fine B-Western star in his own right, and here gives one of his best performances, albeit in a stereotyped "half-breed" role in which his character ends up rejected by both halves of his heritage. But what really has attracted me repeatedly to this serial is the wonderful score, in which the opening title music of the classic "Destry Rides Again" (in which Tom Fadden also appeared) is repeatedly opened up and interwoven with new, more spacious adventures set in the great outdoors surrounding "Sunset Mesa." Those choosing between the VCI and Alpha releases of this serial should be advised that VCI's print quality is well worth spending the extra money for; but Alpha's front cover art is so superior that I actually bought both editions so as to superimpose the Alpha cover over the VCI one. (For a low-budget outfit, Alpha had some of the best art direction in the business; their budget limitations in other areas are suggested by the failure to catch their jacket copy's wayward rendering of "Sunset Mesa" as "Sunset Mason"!)

VCI Entertainment and Universal Pictures present "Winners of the West" (1940) (digitally remastered), 13 Chapters of vintage serial loaded with action sequences featuring heroes and villains Dick Foran, James Craig, Harry Woods, Roy Barcroft and Charles Stevens...there is a great deal of entertainment here for the cliffhanger fans out there...large scale Indian attacks and constant raids by badmen trying to steal locomotives from the railroad...loaded with non-stop action and boasts a cast of thousands...as always life threatening chapters with overturned wagons and railroad explosions

Under director's Ford Beebe and Ray Taylor with screenplay by Charles R. Condon, George H Plympton and Basil Dickey...the cast include Dick Foran (Jeff Ramsay), Anne Nagel (Claire Hartford ), James Craig (Jim Jackson), Tom Fadden (Tex Houston ), Harry Woods (King Carter - boss & leader), Charles Stevens (Snakeye ), Roy Barcroft (Logan - henchman), Edmund Cobb (Maddox - henchman), Edward Keane (John Hartford)...another great serial provided by Universal Pictures during their heyday in the early '40s...John Hartford is in charge of building a railroad heading west and to stop him from going through his town of Blackhawk is King Carter...his henchman Snakeye is stirring up the Indians into attacking the railroad crew. in every direction...now enters our hero Jeff Ramsay and his sidekicks Tex Houston and Jim Jackson who head the crew and keep them out of Harem's way...can Carter along with Snakeye stir up the local Indian tribe under Chief War Eagle succeed in constantly raiding the railroad camp and stop the railroad from coming through...will Claire Hartford be kidnapped and possibly killed....can the trio Foran, Fadden and Craig fight their way clear of Carter's gang of thugs and save the save the day...don't miss one single episode that will keep you thrilled until the next chapter the following week.

B-Western fans keep a look out for old time players the meanest looking gang of bad guys from the stables of Hollywood with their leader Harry Woods (the best of the "B" Western heavies) and the grandson of Geronimo, famous Apache Chief actor Charlie Stevens, Trevor Bardette, Edmond Cobb, Roy Barcroft, Edgar Edwards, Bud Osborne and Tom London as henchmen...and briefly you can catch a glance of Bob Kortman, Ed Cassidy, Kermit Maynard, Bud Osborne and Iron Eyes Cody...seems almost like a class reunion of B-Western alumni...can't make a good Western without those veterans.

CHAPTER TITLES:
Disc One (1)
1. Redskins Ride Again
2. The Wreck at Red River Gorge
3. The Bridge of Disaster
4. Trapped by Redskins
5. Death Strikes the Trail
6. A Leap for Life
7. Thundering Terror
8. The Flaming Arsenal

SPECIAL FEATURES:
BIOS:
Dick Foran
Anne Nagel
Ford Beebe (Director)
Ray Taylor (Director)

CliffHanger Promo:
ADVENTURES OF THE FLYING CADETS (Bobby Jordan)
BUCK ROGERS (Buster Crabbe)
DICK TRACY & G Men (Ralph Byrd)
FLASH GORDON CONQUERS THE UNIVERSE (Buster Crabbe)
JUNGLE GIRL (Edgar Rice Burroughs)
JUNGLE JIM (Grant Withers & Raymond Hatton)
MANDRAKE THE MAGICIAN
THE MIRACLE RIDER (Tom Mix & Tony Jr)
THE PHANTOM (Tom Tyler)
SECRET AGENT X-9 (Lloyd Bridges)
ZANE GREYS 'KING OF THE ROYAL MOUNTED" (Allan Rocky Lane)
ZORRO'S CLIFFHANGER COLLECTION (John Carroll/Reed Hadley/George J. Lewis/Linda Stirling)

CHAPTER TITLES
Disc Two (2)
9. Sacrificed by Savages
10.Under Crashing Timbers
11.Bullets in the Dark
12.The Battle of Blackhawk
13.Barricades Blasted

EXTRAS!
Winners of the West (Dick Foran)
Adventures of Red Ryder (Don "Red" Barry)
Riders of Death Valley (Dick Foran)
Royal Mounted Rides Again (Milburn Stone)

Own them now on DVD....if you crave action, drama and plenty of adventure then this is the place for all of the above...if you enjoyed this serial check out the thrilling Johnny Mack Brown serial "Fighting with Kit Carson" (1933) from VCI Entertainment...also the latest Bobby J. Copeland's book on "Johnny Mack Brown: Up Close & Personal" is chuck full of answers to all the questions his fans had from early on...and the complete account of "Roy Barcroft:King of the Badmen", which is the title of Bobby J. Copeland's book on the life and times of "Republic Pictures Number One Villain" both books published by Empire Publishing and available on Amazon.

Great job by VCI Entertainment for releasing the digital transfere with a clean, clear and crisp print...looking forward to more of the same from the '40s vintage...order your copy now from Amazon or VCI Entertainment, stay tuned once again with a top notch serial from VCI...just the way we like 'em!

Total Time: 247 mins on 2 DVD's ~ VCI Entertainment 8416 ~ (12/28/2004)

The other reviews have covered the story, my reviews are from the view point of movie history. Universal began making serials before there was a Republic or Columbia Pictures, and their concepts and subject matter were usually very imaginative. The pics were also well cast, using the same names as in their B motion pictures,,, Lionel Atwell, Lon Chaney Jr and Noah Berry jr and sr. The writing, directing and music were all first class. With its sister serial, OVERLAND MAIL, Winners of the West had a soundtrack theme I remembered into my adult life. A classic bit of music. But all Universal pics of the late 30s and into the 40s suffered two grating flaws... noise and poor film editing. With the exception of Riders of Death Valley, also a Dick Foran epic Universal Wesrerns were almost comical in their utterly sloppy use of stock footage. The Indian scenes in Winners of the West are the same in every chapter with a dozen different old movies being clipped and one sequence showing redskins riding out of Wyomng across central California into the Arizona desert, sometimes Cheyenne with big eagle feather bonnets, to the bangs haircuts of bareskin Apache. One poor redskin is shot off his horse at least eight times. The big action scenes and their music are ear splittingly LOUD, along with the confusion of splicing clearly unrelated old scenes from the studio library. Otherwise, most of the serial was shot in the live oak California central hill country, is well cast and acted. Riders of Death Valley, in which our star actually sings, has no redskins, has the same landscape(* Deth Valley Nat Park_)and but for a thousand rounds of gunfire which never find their targets, is probably Universal's best western. But, would you believe Dick Foran's name does not appear on the DVD! Generation gap at work.

VCI Entertainment and Universal Pictures present "Winners of the West" (1940) (digitally remastered), 13 Chapters of vintage serial loaded with action sequences featuring heroes and villains Dick Foran, James Craig, Harry Woods, Roy Barcroft and Charles Stevens...there is a great deal of entertainment here for the cliffhanger fans out there...large scale Indian attacks and constant raids by badmen trying to steal locomotives from the railroad...loaded with non-stop action and boasts a cast of thousands...as always life threatening chapters with overturned wagons and railroad explosions

Under director's Ford Beebe and Ray Taylor with screenplay by Charles R. Condon, George H Plympton and Basil Dickey...the cast include Dick Foran (Jeff Ramsay), Anne Nagel (Claire Hartford ), James Craig (Jim Jackson), Tom Fadden (Tex Houston ), Harry Woods (King Carter - boss & leader), Charles Stevens (Snakeye ), Roy Barcroft (Logan - henchman), Edmund Cobb (Maddox - henchman), Edward Keane (John Hartford)...another great serial provided by Universal Pictures during their heyday in the early '40s...John Hartford is in charge of building a railroad heading west and to stop him from going through his town of Blackhawk is King Carter...his henchman Snakeye is stirring up the Indians into attacking the railroad crew. in every direction...now enters our hero Jeff Ramsay and his sidekicks Tex Houston and Jim Jackson who head the crew and keep them out of Harem's way...can Carter along with Snakeye stir up the local Indian tribe under Chief War Eagle succeed in constantly raiding the railroad camp and stop the railroad from coming through...will Claire Hartford be kidnapped and possibly killed....can the trio Foran, Fadden and Craig fight their way clear of Carter's gang of thugs and save the save the day...don't miss one single episode that will keep you thrilled until the next chapter the following week.

B-Western fans keep a look out for old time players the meanest looking gang of bad guys from the stables of Hollywood with their leader Harry Woods (the best of the "B" Western heavies) and the grandson of Geronimo, famous Apache Chief actor Charlie Stevens, Trevor Bardette, Edmond Cobb, Roy Barcroft, Edgar Edwards, Bud Osborne and Tom London as henchmen...and briefly you can catch a glance of Bob Kortman, Ed Cassidy, Kermit Maynard, Bud Osborne and Iron Eyes Cody...seems almost like a class reunion of B-Western alumni...can't make a good Western without those veterans.

CHAPTER TITLES:
Disc One (1)
1. Redskins Ride Again
2. The Wreck at Red River Gorge
3. The Bridge of Disaster
4. Trapped by Redskins
5. Death Strikes the Trail
6. A Leap for Life
7. Thundering Terror
8. The Flaming Arsenal

SPECIAL FEATURES:
BIOS:
Dick Foran
Anne Nagel
Ford Beebe (Director)
Ray Taylor (Director)

CHAPTER TITLES
Disc Two (2)
9. Sacrificed by Savages
10.Under Crashing Timbers
11.Bullets in the Dark
12.The Battle of Blackhawk
13.Barricades Blasted

If you're into vintage serials as I am, why not pick up a copy of the following titles from VCI Home Video:
VCI CLIFFHANGER TRAILERS:
1. Adventures of Red Ryder (Don "Red" Barry)
2. Adventures of the Flying Cadets (Bobby Jordan)
3. Buck Rogers (Buster Crabbe)
4. Captain Midnight (Dave O'Brien)
5. Captain Video: Master of the Stratosphere (Judd Holdren & I. Stanford Jolley)
6. Dick Tracy's G-Men (Ralph Byrd)
7. Don Winslow of the Navy (Don Terry)
8. Don Winslow of the Coast Guard (Don Terry)
9. Drums of Fu Manchu (Henry Brandon)
10.Fighting Kit Carson (Johnny Mack Brown)
11.Flash Gordon Conquers the Universe (Buster Crabbe)
12.The Green Archer (Victory Jory)
13.Jungle Girl (Frances Gifford)
14.Jungle Jim (Grant Withers & Raymond Hatton)
15.Lost City of the Jungle (Russell Hayden & Keye Luke)
16.Mandrake the Magician (Warren Hull & Dick Curtis)
17.Miracle Rider (Tom Mix & Tony Jr)
18.The Painted Stallion (Ray "Crash" Corrigan)
19.The Phantom (Tom Tyler)
20.The Return of Chandu (Bela Lugosi)
21.Riders of Death Valley (Dick Foran, Leo Carrillo & Buck Jones)
22.Secret Agent X-9 (1937) (Scott Kolk & Henry Brandon)
23.Secret Agent X-9 (1945) (Lloyd Bridges & Keye Luke)
24.Sky Raiders (Donald Woods & Billy Halop)
25.Undersea Kingdom (Ray "Crash" Corrigan)
26.Winners of the West (Dick Foran, Harry Woods, Roy Barcroft & Charles Stevens)
27.Zane Greys "King of the Royal Mounted" (Allan "Rocky" Lane)
28.Zorro's Cliffhanger Collection (Reed Hadley, John Carroll & Linda Stirling) Coming soon January 2006 from VCI Home Video on DVD..."FLAMING FRONTIERS" (1938), Universal Serial with 15 chapters, featuring Johnny Mack Brown, Eleanor Hansen, John Archer, James Blaine and Ralph Bowman..."OREGON TRAIL" (1939), another Universal Serial with 15 exciting chapters featuring Johnny Mack Brown, Fuzzy Knight, Roy Barcoft and Charles King..."THE TALL TEXAN" (1953), full length feature starring Lloyd Bridges, Lee J Cobb, Luther Adler and Marie Windsor...watch for more details on VCI Entertainment and Amazon your two favorite sites for serials and B-Westerns.

Great job by VCI Entertainment for releasing the digital transfere with a clean, clear and crisp print...looking forward to more of the same from the '40s vintage...order your copy now from Amazon or VCI Entertainment, stay tuned once again with a top notch serial from VCI...just the way we like 'em!

Total Time: 247 mins on 2 DVD's ~ VCI Entertainment 8416 ~ (12/28/2004)