Tag Archives: William P. Thompson

R.G. Springsteen’s Santa Fe Uprising was a bittersweet viewing experience for yours truly. On the one hand, I really enjoy this series, based on Fred Harman’s comic-strip cowboy. It’s solid, fun, Saturday matinée entertainment. On the other hand, a big part of my enjoyment came from the wooden, straight-shooting acting style of “Wild” Bill Elliott as Red. Elliott’s persona was so stolid that it seemed tongue-in-cheek, and he had great chemistry with the child star who played his Indian sidekick Little Beaver (Bobby Blake, who later in life would be known as “defendant Robert Blake [9/18/33], aka Michael Gubitosi”).

After starring in 16 Red Ryder pictures from 1944 to 1946, Elliott bowed out and was replaced by square-jawed matinée idol Allan Lane. In the title sequence of Santa Fe Uprising, in which Red Ryder and Little Beaver appear in motion on the cover of a storybook, Lane bears a striking resemblance to Elliott. Up close, however, he’s more traditionally handsome and less interesting a performer.

Still, director Springsteen is a professional, and he keeps things fast-moving and exciting despite a modest budget and familiar shooting locations.

The film takes place in Bitter Springs, New Mexico, in 1894. The action kicks off when the U.S. Marshal for the territory is murdered by stagecoach robbers. The editor of the Territorial Gazette, a man named Crawford (Barton MacLane), demands that his killers be found. There is a toll road that’s safer to travel on than the main road, but the man who owns the property through which the toll road runs demands $3 a head of cattle to use it, which few ranchers can afford. When old rancher Lafe Dibble (Tom London) is killed by bandits, his son, Sonny Dibble (Pat Michaels), vows revenge.

Red takes over as U.S. Marshal of the territory, but he finds himself in hot water when it turns out that Crawford’s motives might not be as pure as they seem. When a man is murdered, and it looks as if Sonny killed him, Crawford and his boys demand that Sonny be strung up despite the fact that he professes his innocence. Things go from bad to worse when Little Beaver is kidnapped, held as a possible exchange for Sonny, after Crawford’s crew fails to bust Sonny out of jail to lynch him.

During the last part of the picture, Red is sleep-deprived after searching for Little Beaver night and day, which leads to a lot of strange acting from Lane, who keeps opening his eyes wide and half-yawning.

But if you’ve ever seen a western programmer before, you know that neither rain, nor snow, nor sleet, nor sleep deprivation shall keep the heroes from their appointed shoot-outs, from which they will always emerge victorious.