Updates and ARCS

A few updates today and a preview of coming attractions:

First, Elisabeth of The Second Sentence blog, and Western story writer and devotee, made the discovery that some of the horse stampede scenes from Red Canyon (1949), which we discussed here, were re-used in a 1964 episode called “The Black Stallion” of the TV show The Virginian.  I’m pasting her comments here:

It also features a gorgeous black stallion with a white star on its forehead, and there are some wonderful scenes of wild horse herds on the run—a lot of it stock footage cut in, some of which I've seen in other episodes of the same show. When I was watching it last night, there was a brief shot of the stallion escaping into a red sandstone canyon, and something clicked in my head. The Virginian was a Universal show, and I know they re-used footage (and even reworked scripts) from earlier Universal films sometimes. Could a bit of footage from Red Canyon have found its way into "The Black Stallion"? I guess I'll have to wait until I can track down a copy of the movie to be sure…

Here's a part of "The Black Stallion" from YouTube—the brief clip with the canyon is at about 11:15: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47Ioq-XLG2Q.  The whole sequence with the horse herd begins around 6:25.

The color of that video is very blurry and faded compared to the crisp DVDs, where the red sandstone in that shot contrasts with the landscape in the rest of the scene.  That's what made me notice it and think it might be stock footage.

Elisabeth was spot-on.  I took at look at the link she provided, and these scenes are most definitely from Red Canyon.  Great eye, and great detective work, Elisabeth.

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The CMBA spring blogathon this year is going to be The Fabulous Films of the 1930s and will run from April 27^th through May 1^st.  Have a look here for the list of great blogs participating and their offerings for this blogathon.

I’ll be tackling Hallelujah, I’m  a Bum! (1933) starring Al Jolson, Edgar Connor, Madge Evans, and Frank Morgan, directed by Lewis Milestone.  It’s a real zeitgeist piece of Great Depression hijinks about Central Park homeless (more fun than it sounds), and my post will run next Thursday, April 30^th.

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My launch date for Ann Blyth: Actress. Singer. Star. is just two months away.  Next week, on Friday, May 1^st, I hope to email out ARCs for reviewers of the book (Advanced Reading Copies) in PDF form.  If anyone cares to review the book, please drop me an email so I can send you one.  More on the book in weeks to come.