Riders of the Whistling Skull is a weird, dusty fever dream

Is it worth your time?

If you have a soft spot for old-school serials and don't mind a movie that makes up its own rules as it goes, sure. Give it a watch. If you need logic or, you know, a budget that covers more than two caves and a handful of props, you’re probably going to hate it.

There’s something about the title Riders of the Whistling Skull that just demands you stop scrolling and click play. It sounds like a comic book from the thirties, and honestly, the movie delivers exactly that kind of energy.

The whole thing feels like a fever dream you’d have after eating too much cheese before bed. The Mesquiteers show up, there’s some archeology talk that makes zero sense, and suddenly everyone is wandering through a labyrinthine city of gold.

The vibe

The cinematography is weirdly moody for a western. Most of these films look like they were shot at noon in a parking lot, but here, everything is draped in shadows and low-light mystery. It almost feels like a horror movie that lost its way on the set of Somewhere in Sonora.

There is a moment near the middle where they enter a cave, and the silence is just... loud. It goes on for way too long. I’m pretty sure I could hear the camera operator breathing. It was great.

Some odd notes

• The "city of gold" looks suspiciously like a bunch of painted cardboard boxes. I don't care. It works.
• Max Terhune is doing his ventriloquism bit again. It’s either the best part of the movie or the reason to turn it off immediately. I haven't decided yet.
• The horses seem way more confused than the actors, which is honestly saying something.

It’s not as polished as Something to Sing About, but that’s the charm. It feels like a bunch of people just decided to make a movie about a ghost city because why not? No studio executive was probably watching the monitors.

I found myself wondering if they ever actually found anything of value, or if the whole gold city thing was just a hallucination brought on by heat stroke. The movie doesn't really care, and honestly, I stopped caring about twenty minutes in. I just wanted to see if the whistling skull actually whistled.

It does. And it’s hilarious. 💀