The Dawn Rider

This is one of John Wayne's very early B-Westerns (1935), before he became a big "A-movie" star. The plot, which involves the Duke's father being murdered, and Wayne wounded, by robbers, is fairly standard by B-Western standards, but entertaining enough. The old black-and-white film was colorized in recent times, and the colorization was well done.

The Duke has not yet adopted his Harry Carey-taught style of talking, with occasional pauses in the middle of sentences, so he sounds a little different than the later John Wayne. The fight scenes are not done as well as they were in, let's say, Gene Autry's first starring film, "Tumbling Tumbleweeds," released about three months later.

But the colorizers did study the script and insert ironic "plays on words" in a couple of scenes. When Wayne is told by a cowboy he's having problems with that there's "no need for lavender cowboys" or words to that effect, he's wearing a purple shirt. Later, when the same cowboy asks the Duke if he wants to continue a fight they were having, and Wayne says, "No," the other guy says, "Why? You yellow?" Yes, you guessed it, dear readers --in that scene, the Duke is wearing a yellow shirt.

And in an early scene where Wayne's opponent has whipped another cowboy, and begins firing his six-shooter at the man's feet to make him "dance," I thought of a scene in "Tumbling Tumbleweeds" where one of Autry's buddies gets the drop on three bad guys and tells them to "dance." One says, "Aww, we can't dance!" And the guy with the gun replies, "Anyone can dance if they're properly persuaded!" The bad guys begin cutting a rug immediately.

I wondered, "Did the director of the Autry movie pick up and use those two situations?" Because at one point in the Autry movie, a "bad guy" tells a singing cowboy Gene, "We don't need no lavender cowboys!"

Overall, "The Dawn Rider" is a good B-Western -- but "Tumbling Tumbleweeds" has better acting, and some great songs.