Texas Gun Fighter: Horses are better actors than people

Is it worth your time?

If you like old-school, dusty B-Westerns where the plot happens in about twenty minutes and the rest is just riding, you'll be fine. If you need a script that makes sense or actors who aren't just reading off cue cards, stay away. This is pure Saturday matinee filler.

Ken Maynard is our hero, Bill Dane. He plays the whole thing with the same expression he probably used for breakfast. It’s not necessarily bad, it’s just... very static.

Cinematic perspective: Exploring the visual vocabulary of Texas Gun Fighter (1932) through its definitive frames.

The plot is basically just a circle. Outlaws quit gang, outlaws become sheriff, outlaws get captured, outlaws escape. It’s like watching a re-run of a show you forgot you already watched.

Tarzan the horse is the real highlight here. I’m not joking. When the horse is on screen, the movie actually has some energy. He’s got more personality than half the guys in the saloon scenes.

Cinematic perspective: Exploring the visual vocabulary of Texas Gun Fighter (1932) through its definitive frames.

Some random notes from my notepad:

• The sound quality is so scratchy you’d think the film was buried in the desert for fifty years.
• The gunfights are hilarious. Nobody ever seems to aim. They just kind of wave the pistols around and people fall over.
• There's a scene where the villains are just standing in a room talking for what feels like an hour. My coffee went cold before they even pulled a trigger.
• I kept thinking of Thrills of Yesterday while watching this. Same kind of vibe, just without the nostalgia filter.

The pacing is all over the place. Sometimes it’s a gallop, and then suddenly it slows to a crawl where they discuss gold bullion like it’s a tax meeting. It’s weirdly boring for a movie about outlaws.

I didn’t hate it. It’s just very simple. It feels like someone just threw a bunch of western tropes into a blender and pressed pulse a few times. It’s not trying to be The Flirt or anything fancy like that. It just wants to exist for an hour.

Maybe skip it unless you’re a completionist for 1930s horse operas. Or if you really, really like horses. Tarzan really is a good boy. 🐎