Empty Saddles: A Dusty Little Ride

Is it worth your time?

If you like your movies to feel like they were pulled directly from a dusty trunk in an attic, Empty Saddles is worth a look. It is for the folks who get a kick out of old-school saddle tramp logic and guys who can shoot a gun out of a hand from fifty paces. If you need complex subtext or modern pacing, stay far away. You will probably find yourself bored to tears before the first horse race finishes.

Buck Jones plays it steady, which is really all you can ask for in a movie like this. He buys a ranch that looks like it hasn't seen a drop of water in a decade. Naturally, the neighbors are awful, and the outlaws are worse. It feels less like a real ranch and more like a series of sets waiting for a brawl to break out.

Odd moments and observations

• The transition from cattle ranch to dude ranch happens with almost zero actual work shown.
• I’m pretty sure one of the sheep men is just wearing the same hat as the bad guy from Stopping Bullets, but maybe I'm just seeing things.
• The kidnapping plot arrives like a bolt from the blue, just to make sure we don't get too comfortable with the scenery.

There is this one scene where a conversation happens in front of a fence that looks like it’s about to fall over if anyone sneezes. I found myself staring at the wood grain more than the actors. Sometimes the movie forgets it has a plot and just lets the horses stand around. Honestly, I liked those parts best.

The dialogue is snappy in that weird, old-fashioned way where nobody talks like a human being. It’s all, "I reckon I'll be seein' you at the canyon, stranger." It’s fun, but it’s definitely not poetry. It reminds me of the pacing issues I had with Way Down East, though this one keeps things moving a bit faster to its own detriment.

There is no real attempt to build tension. The villains show up, they grunt, they kidnap, they get shot at. Wash, rinse, repeat. It isn't trying to be The Woman on the Jury in terms of grit, and that’s probably for the best. It knows exactly what it is—a quick Saturday matinee filler that expects you to be halfway through a bag of popcorn by the time the credits roll.

I left the screen feeling like I’d just had a very fast, very dry sandwich. Not bad, just... there. 🌵