DVD News #314: Buck Jones Western Collection (1930-33).

Critics’ Choice has really come on with a bang, announcing DVD sets movie nuts have been asking for. The Buck Jones Western Collection sounds terrific, gathering up nine of his Columbia pictures from 1930 to 1933, including one with John Wayne.

Men Without Law (1930)
Directed by Louis King
Starring Buck Jones, Carmelita Geraghty, Thomas Carrmin)

The Avenger (1931)
Directed by Roy William Neill
Starring Buck Jones, Dorothy Revier, Otto Hoffman

Branded (1931)
Directed by D. Ross Lederman
Starring Buck Jones, Ethel Kenyon, Wallace MacDonald.

The Deadline (1931)
Directed by Lambert Hillyer
Starring Buck Jones, Loretta Sayers, Robert Ellis

The Range Feud (1931)
Directed by D. Ross Lederman
Starring Buck Jones, John Wayne, Susan Fleming

Forbidden Trail (1932)
Directed by Lambert Hillyer
Starring Buck Jones, Barbara Weeks, George Cooper

The Thrill Hunter (1933)
Directed by George B. Seitz
Starring Buck Jones, Dorothy Revier, Arthur Rankin

The California Trail (1933)
Directed by Lambert Hillyer
Starring Buck Jones, Helen Mack, Luis Albert

Unknown Valley (1933)
Directed by Lambert Hillyer
Starring Buck Jones, Cecilia Parker, Wade Boteler

With this set and the serials on Blu-Ray from VCI, this is a great time for Buck Jones fans. Recommended.

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Blu-Ray News #304: Riders Of Death Valley (1941).

Directed by Ford Beebe and Ray Taylor
Screen Play by Sherman L. Lowe, George Plympton, Basil Dickey, Jack O’Donnell
Original Story by Oliver Drake
Photography: Jerome Ash and William A. Sickner
Starring Dick Foran, Leo Carrillo, Buck Jones, Charles Bickford, Guinn “Big Boy” Williams, Lon Chaney, Jr., Noah Beery, Jr., Jeanne Kelly, Glenn Strange, Roy Barcroft

VCI is prepping another Universal serial for Blu-Ray release, 1941’s “million dollar super serial with a million thrills,” Riders Of Death Valley. 

While I doubt they spent that much on it, it certainly has a million-dollar cast — the likes of Dick Foran, Buck Jones, Charles Bickford, Guinn “Big Boy” Williams, Lon Chaney, Jr., Noah Beery, Jr., Glenn Strange and Roy Barcroft!

For the Blu-ray, VCI will use original 35mm material. A still gallery and two-chapter commentary from yours truly will be included. This is a cool serial and should be a really nice release.

A few years later, Lon Chaney, Jr. and Glenn Strange would take each other on again in Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948), with Chaney as Larry Talbot, the Wolf Man, and Strange as Frankenstein’s monster.

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Pre-50s Western Blu-Ray News #297: Gordon Of Ghost City (1933) And The Phantom Rider (1936).

VCI Entertainment has announced the upcoming Blu-Ray release of two terrific Buck Jones serials from Universal — Gordon Of Ghost City (1933) and The Phantom Rider (1936). Gordon was the first of six serials Buck Jones would do for Universal.

Both come from director Ray Taylor, who did a number of serials, including The Green Hornet and Flash Gordon Conquers The Universe (both 1940). Early in his long, prolific career, he was an assistant director for John Ford.

Both are sourced from original 35mm fine grain material — and both will feature liner notes from yours truly.

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