Stagecoach War (1940) User Reviews

"Hey, that Hopalong Cassidy sure is a fightin' fool!"

[classicsoncall · 5/10 · 23 December 2014]

Well this is one head scratcher of a B Western - the nominal bad guy of the piece (Harvey Stephens) winds up getting the girl, the stagecoach bandits are a quartet of singing outlaws, and Lucky Jenkins (Russell Hayden) isn't so lucky. You'd be hard pressed to figure out which way this one was going until it's all over, and even then, you might be left wondering about what just happened.

The main plot involves the local town boss of Blue Sky, Neal Holt (Stephens), attempting to take over the competing Chapman Stagecoach line and win the new Wells Fargo shipping contract. When Hopalong Cassidy (William Boyd) arrives on scene, they face off in a manner of speaking, with Hoppy challenging Holt's rig and horses to a race to determine who gets the contract. On the face of it this doesn't seem to be too complicated, but Hoppy's sidekick Lucky has an eye for Holt's girl Shirley (Julie Carter), and begs Hoppy to let him drive the stagecoach in the race to impress the gal. But Shirley sneaks into Holt's coach and calls out to Lucky to pull up during the race! Granted, there was some imminent danger on a narrow trail along side a steep drop-off, but the scenario painted Lucky as a big time loser, for which the betting citizens of Blue Sky took out their frustration by pounding him into the ground. Fortunately, Hoppy made the save for his buddy.

Back to those singing outlaws - I should have suspected something was up when one of the baddies shot the piano while the boys were performing a number at the local saloon. It didn't seem to improve the piano any, but then again, I have a tin ear. The real surprise later on in the story was when the King's Men performed their third song, Eddie Dean wound up in the middle of it right out of the blue.

So anyway, this is my third Hopalong Cassidy picture in three days, and each one seemed to offer something just a bit offbeat or unusual that I hadn't seen before in a B oater. Even the comedic sidekick Speedy (Britt Wood) seemed to be more annoying than funny; maybe next time I'll be luckier than Lucky.

For the forces of law and the forces of love and romance

[bkoganbing · 5/10 · 19 July 2014]

Stagecoach War has one thing I've not seen either in any western film let alone a Hopalong Cassidy film, singing outlaws. Singing cowboys are usually the leads and the good guys. But in this film someone at Paramount hired the vocal group The King's Men together with future cowboy hero Eddie Dean as a group of outlaws who've got great harmony.

These outlaws are having a great old time robbing two competing stagecoach lines, one run by Harvey Stephens and the other run by J. Farrell MacDonald and his daughter Julie Carter. It's business and personal because Stephens and Carter were once and item. In the mix comes Russell Hayden who as the young Hoppy sidekick gets to do a lot of romancing but never gets the girl.

There's a thrilling stagecoach race to see who gets the Wells Fargo mail contract. In the end all is resolved for the law and for the forces of love and romance.

Hoppy also gets to speak his peace about that unsung hero of the west the prairie mustang. Speaking it I couldn't help being reminded of those mustang horses in The Misfits. Hoppy did say they would wind up as dog food

This film not the greatest of Cassidy films definitely isn't dog food.

Poor Hoppy movie

[chipe · 5/10 · 26 October 2014]

I gave this 5 out of 10, the worst Hoppy movie I have seen so far. As others have said, it moved slowly, especially with the three songs. I big downer is Julie Carter (the heroine), bad in so many ways, I'll be kind and not list them. Not surprising that she appeared in only about a dozen works, most of them as uncredited. As others pointed out here, it is novel, to say the least, that the SOLE bad guys/killers were the amusing-friendly-looking singing cowboys. One far-fetched thing was the girl hiding in one of the coaches during the stagecoach race, though it was important for the plot. Another unusual thing (that I would rate as good) is that all the main characters ended up as honest friendly good guys, reconciling at the end. That made the film easy to take and amiable.

Odd Hoppy Musical Film

[wrbtu · 26 February 2007]

There are several odd things about this film: 1) it contained three songs (a lot for a Hoppy movie), that really slowed things down quite a bit; 2) the songs were all sung by the baddies, a highly unusual feature which made it appear that they were the good guys; 3) Hoppy, as prophet, predicted that some day men will fly (since he predicted this in the "1870s," perhaps he was in the wrong field as a horse rancher!); 4) William Boyd actually did some of his own stunt work; & 5) the plot was unusually complicated for a Hoppy film. On the positive side were seeing Boyd looking to be in his prime, dressed in the all-black outfit, an impassioned speech by Hoppy on the virtues of the Mustang, veteran character actor Frank Lackteen effective as a baddie, & an interesting story. On the negative side were the songs, the slow moving plot, & the inferior humor provided by Gabby Hayes substitute Britt Wood (as "Speedy," a one-joke wonder). I found a lot to like about this film, but in the end I felt that something was missing. Only a 6/10.

Very weak and poorly written.

[planktonrules · 3/10 · 7 October 2020]

I have enjoyed watching the Hopalong Cassidy films that I've seen nearly all 66 since I discovered them on YouTube. Much of it is because they are enjoyable and better than a typical B-western. Much of it is because the copies on YouTube are exceptional...complete and clean copies. However, even though I really enjoy the films, I must admit that a few are klunkers...and this is true of "Stagecoach War"...mostly because the writing was really poor.

So why wasn't I pleased with it? Well, one is the singing...something you DON'T associate with Hopalong Cassidy films. But in this one, there inexplicably is a trio who sing barbershop quartet-style tunes that just don't fit the film and were distracting. There also was a lack of any real serious villainy and more focused on Lucky and his REALLY stupid infatuation. First, the girl really didn't encourage him and was clear she was interested in another...but like the creepy guy he is in the film, Lucky won't take the hint. Second, the girl is nonsensical and her actions (such as sneaking aboard a stagecoach in a race) made no sense at all. Emotionally, the lady was simply all over the place! There's more...including several instances where folks behave in ways that simply make no sense, but frankly, it's so boring and unlike other films, I'll just leave it at that. A huge miss...don't assume all Cassidy films are like this one!

By the way, if you care, this is the final film where Britt Wood appeared as Speedy....not one of the better Hopalong Cassidy sidekicks.

One of the best!

[JohnHowardReid · 8/10 · 6 February 2018]

SYNOPSIS: Hopalong Cassidy, Lucky Jenkins and Speedy are driving a herd of Bar 20 mustangs to Bluesky, to be delivered to Jeff Chapman, operator of a stage line. They come upon Jeff's runaway stage, which has just been looted of silver bullion by Smiley and his singing outlaws. They had shot Jeff and left him to die. The Bar 20 riders give Jeff first aid, and Lucky tools the stage into town. There, Lucky is hard smitten by Jeff's lovely daughter, Shirley. But it turns out, however, that she is in love with Neal Holt, who has designs on the mail carrying contract held by Jeff.

NOTES: Number 30 of the 66-picture series (Zinman's numbering. Paramount reckons it's number 34). Harry Sherman reckons that Boyd himself does the climactic stunt of jumping from the runaway stagecoach to the back of Russell Hayden's horse. "So perfectly did Bill time his leap, that only one take was necessary," said Sherman. "Bill made a perfect landing back of Hayden's saddle." Yeah, tell us another whopper, Harry. If Boyd actually did this, Harry would have been sued by the insurance people. And banned from movie-making for life! Locations in Kernville, California.

COMMENT: Certainly one of the more interesting of the Hoppy entries, this one has a slam-bang double climax. It's also one of Russell Harlan's most attractively photographed ventures. Another feature that makes the film unusually interesting is the script's switcheroo in making the singing team the outlaw band. Years later, when a Brazilian arthouse movie called O Cangaceiro did this very same thing, the idea was hailed by the corduroy set as so imaginative and so innovative and so astoundingly daring and stylish as to elevate the maker of that movie to the ranks of a cinema genius. Needless to say, the corduroy brigade have never seen Stagecoach War. Even if this history was pointed out to them, they would dismiss it as of no consequence. You can't tell anything to fools.

Stagecoach War

[coltras35 · 4/10 · 20 February 2024]

Stagecoach War features veteran character actor J. Farrell McDonald as Jeff Chapman, a stage-line owner about to lose a lucrative Wells Fargo contract after his driver is shot in a holdup. The crime opens a door for Neal Holt (Harvey Stephens), who is not only a rival stage-line operator, but also the former boyfriend of Jeff's daughter, Shirley (Julie Carter).

There's many musical numbers, with singing cowboys and outlaws and there is a exciting Stagecoach chase, however it's not too engaging and the love triangle between Lucky, Shirley and shirley's ambitious former boyfriend doesn't add much in terms of drama. I guess it's a different type of Hoppy with not too much shootin', and the good guys (who I thought were harmless singers as presented in these type of westerns) turning out the bad guys but not too memorable.