A rambunctious Western about Forrest Tucker pitting his Rock Island Line against the retrograde stagecoach or steamboat line run by Bruce Cabot, the heavy, who doesn't want the railroad cutting into his profits. Chill Wills is the earthy comic sidekick. Adele Mara is the girl the two principals fight over. She had the oddest eyes. My Dx? Thyrotoxic storm, secondary to an acute infraction of the myoculinary.

The writing is by James Edward Grant. His point of view was never very subtle. There tends to be a patriarchal leader and the others were followers, especially the women. He later went on to write for John Wayne's later Westerns because, as the Duke put it, "He knows how to write for me." The result was a string of turkeys, unfortunately, and the image of the unyielding Wayne that we've all come to love. When he spoke, it was like one of the faces on Mount Rushmore opening its mouth to utter some rocky platitude.

And either the writing or the editing leaves some events without explanation. I don't know why -- just before the climactic battle -- several stalled cars blow up. Is it good or bad that the bridge was destroyed? It's treated as good.

Here, Grant is given to more flowery dialog. When someone accounts for an incident, the listener comments, not "That's reasonable" or "That's possible," but "That's plausible." (Twice.) "Shall" is sometimes substituted for "will," willy nilly, so to speak. Sometimes it works. "Kirby has such a wealth of manners and such a poverty of ethics." "I grow repetitious in my spinsterhood." Not much attention is paid to the other elements of the film. R. Dale Butts did the music which, in one scene, is directly ripped off from "The Lieutenant Kije Suite." You won't hear the song, "Rock Island Line," and you shouldn't, because it was a prisoner's song in Arkansas and first recorded in 1934. Intead, you'll hear a terrible paean to the sights out West. Bruce Cabot and Roy Corey (as Abe Lincoln) may wear proper dress but everybody else looks like an ordinary cowboy in an ordinary Western. Weapons: ditto. The direction by Joseph Kane is pedestrian except that the climactic action scene aboard the train is handled well and there is some admirable stunt work.

U.K. release title: TRANSCONTINENT EXPRESS.

SYNOPSIS: The construction engineer of the Rock Island Railroad pushes the line west across the Mississippi in spite of financial complications, a treacherous steamboat tycoon, and hostile Indians. - Copyright Summary.

NOTES: Dedicated to the men and women who devoted their lives to developing and perfecting the railroads of the U.S.A.

COMMENT: Routine western made more palatable by a screenplay that has a slight but genuine leavening of wit. And any film with Bruce Cabot as the villain is necessarily one worth seeing. Bruce and Bruce's double have some fine fights with Tucker and Tucker's double, beginning with an outlandish duel with mops dipped in boiling soup. Unfortunately their climactic confrontation is disappointing.

Though there's plenty of action at the climax, the script provides a thumbs down cop-out for the romantic triangle. Miss Mara is an uninteresting heroine anyway. Still, the support cast is loaded with familiar figures including Dick Elliott as a train conductor, Olin Howland as a barman with a bucket of water, James Flavin as a grumbling track-layer. The Jeff Corey episode is alone worth seeing the film.

If only Kane's direction were not so flat and scrupulously uninteresting, if only Republic's production values (despite the use of actual locations and a real railroad and clever miniatures) were a little higher and relied less on such obvious cost-saving devices as phony backdrops and cycloramas and day for night photography. Even the color tends to be flat and uninteresting despite its warm brown hues and blue cloudy skies.

Grant Withers is miscast as Mara's financier father, Chill Wills has his usual serio-comic role (nice scene with Jack Pennick as an eager trooper).

Yes, the film has all the makings, including plenty of action, but it doesn't quite make the higher grade.

OTHER VIEWS: The script plays like a John Wayne/Vera Ralston/Albert Dekker reject that has been farmed out to Republic's second-stringers. Even in its boring triangle with Adrian Booth half-heartedly giving the charmless Adele Mara a run for the surly affections of frozen-faced Forrest Tucker, the movie is strictly a black and white affair: stolid hero, loyal comic sidekick, frilly girl, deep-dyed villain. The fights between hero and heavy form the best part of the action, culminating in a fair, if familiar, action climax.

Whilst the color is variable and the direction totally dull, production values indicate a fair-sized budget. Vintage train buffs will enjoy the movie. So will fans of the Lydecker Brothers' realistic miniatures. - JHR writing as George Addison.

Predominantly, a light-hearted railroad "eastern", much like Cecil de Milles' "Union Pacific", of 1939, except shot in color. Includes constant friction between Reed Loomis(Forrest Tucker),of the pre-Civil War Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific railroad and Kirby Morrow(Bruce Cabot),representing rival steamboat interests, during the early years of this rail line, when it was building track across Illinois to Rock Island, and then a bridge across the Mississippi, to Davenport and beyond. We have a couple of incidences involving Native Americans, one featured in the climax, with many Sioux(presumably)attacking the moving and stationary train, with bows and arrows, mainly. Eventually, another horde of Native Americans(presumably, Sioux-hating Sauk) arrive and create quite a chaotic scene. About half way through the film, a woman(Lorna Gray, as Aleeta)shows up, speaking Parisian French, but claiming she is the granddaughter of the Sauk peace chief. When going to visit her Sauk friends, she dons her Sauk outfit.

Much of the general background of the plot is based on history. The CRIP railway began in 1851, and this story evidently takes place 5-6 years later. The current financial panic of 1857 is mentioned, as affecting the financing of rail expansion.

There's plenty of action dispersed between the romantic and business talk scenes. Tucker, along with Chill Wills(as Hogger),provide most of the humor., and mainly at the expense of Morrow or his henchmen. It's soon pretty clear that Reed(Tucker) will steal the choice female(Adele Mara, as Constance Strong from Morrow. She is the daughter of David Strong, apparently the chief financier of the railroad, whom we meet periodically.

Some episodes I don't much understand. For example, under the cover of darkness, Morrow sneaks on a boat loaded with cotton and fuels, and detaches its mooring, starting a fire. Meanwhile, Reed swims out to the boat and climbs aboard to fight with Morrow. Eventually , flames are leaping all around them , Morrow jumps overboard before Reed, when explosions begin to disintegrate the boat. It is now close to the bridge, and destroys part of it so it cannot be repaired. This followed by a court case, in which the railroad is represented by Abe Lincoln, based on a historical happening. Lincoln often represented a railroad in litigation.

You have to see the "duel" between Reed and Morrow occasioned by a remark by Reed that Morrow took offense to. Reed gets the choice of weapon. He chooses a pair of nearby soaking mops. The ensuing fight, in a restaurant, is quite funny.

Several times, a song, apparently titled " The Rock Island Train" is sung, beginning with a barbershop quartet, with Adele chiming in. She started her entertainment career very young, as a singer and dancer.

It's nice to see Forrest Tucker in the Hero's role. In my experience, he was usually cast as a villain. He did a good job.

Available in color at YouTube