Marketic It's no definitive masterpiece but it's damn close.

InformationRap This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

Cissy Évelyne It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

Bob This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

Leofwine_draca THE DESERT TRAIL is a somewhat unremarkable early outing for John Wayne in which the actor's larger-than-life presence, although not quite as out-there and assured as later on in his career, is the best thing about the movie. He plays a rodeo star who finds himself accused of a crime he didn't commit, forcing him to leave town with his buddy. Much of this is a bickering comedy which is workable enough, but there's not much in the way of action to get excited about and the whole thing is more than a little dated. The driving orchestral score seems to have been added on at a later date as it sounds very modern.

tavm Well, this is the first I've seen one of John Wayne's B-westerns, pre-Stagecoach, and I watched for one reason only: It's the only one that features a grown-up Mary Kornman, formerly of the silent "Our Gang" series. Her charms are still ample here as when she was a pre-teen but her part mainly calls for her to react to the "arguments" between Wayne and his conman cohort, Eddy Chandler. There's a funny scene in the beginning where Wayne manages to woo Carmen Laroux while Chandler has to sit silently because earlier the latter promised to act "dumb" so he wouldn't get mixed up with another woman but the way Wayne stomps on Chandler's foot every time the latter tries to punch him never became funny with me. A later scene with the Duke asking for some tonic on the top shelf is funny though since Kornman seems partly aware of John wanting to check her out! The story itself fits the 52-minute running time so there's no stretching at the seems. All in all, The Desert Trail was a somewhat enjoyable time-waster. P.S. There's a mix of both actual score music by Lee Zahler from the original print and latter-day additional scoring from William Barber that are obvious depending on how the music sounds though Barber's score isn't too distracting. And Ms. Kornman eventually became an expert horsewoman herself before she died on June 1, 1973.

John W Chance One of the more 'literate' Lone Stars, with time spent on character development and interaction, dialog and acting business. The opening scene sets the stage (literally) for the personalities of the gambler, Kansas Charlie (Eddy Chandler), and his buddy, John Scott (John Wayne) the rodeo (say Roh-Day-oh) star, both of whom are slightly randy. The film follows their adventures, as they try to best each other in the pursuit of the Mexican Juanita, and later in their pursuit of perky Mary Kornman, who has the inevitable evil brother (though he'd been led astray by the real villain, and wants to repent). And oh, of course, they're being wrongly accused of two crimes and have to serve jail time before escaping and being exonerated at the end.The high point is Scott continually and deliberately ogling Mary's butt in her grocery store, and knocking away the ladder she's standing on so he can catch her and grab her as she falls. It all seems a little contemporary for a 30s western, but it sounds better than it actually is. Sadly, the exciting action elements we find in many other Lone Stars are sorely missing here. No Yakima Canutt. Cheap and bad uses of stock footage of riders falling off horses. No George Hayes. Tedious Stooge-like bi-play between Scott and Charlie, with Charlie swinging at Scott, Scott stomping on his foot and then punching him (repeated two more times!). The skilled Paul Fix is underused. Eddy Chandler himself, here in his big star turn, is not really believable as a randy side kick. The villain looks too old and fat. So does Chandler, who spent his later career in 300 more movies as an uncredited meatloaf. Mary Kornman, of the twenties "Our Gang" (see 'Mary, Queen of Tots' 1925) is cute in her scenes with John Wayne, but that's about it for this one. Seeds of a better western lie buried here.P.S. The ultra-short colorized version, which looks good, moves along so fast, it's over if you blink more than once. Thankfully though, the embarrassing scenes with Eddy Chandler have been cut.

aimless-46 Before I explain the "Alias" comment let me say that "The Desert Trail" is bad even by the standards of westerns staring The Three Stooges. In fact it features Carmen Laroux as semi- bad girl Juanita, when you hear her Mexican accent you will immediately recognize her as Senorita Rita from the classic Stooge short "Saved by the Belle". In "The Desert Trail" John Wayne gets to play the Moe Howard character and Eddy Chandler gets to play Curly Howard. Like their Stooge counterparts a running gag throughout the 53- minute movie is Moe hitting Curly. Wayne's character, a skirt chasing bully, is not very endearing, but is supposed to be the good guy. Playing a traveling rodeo cowboy Wayne holds up the rodeo box office at gunpoint and takes the prize money he would have won if the attendance proceeds had been good-the other riders have to settle for 25 cents on the dollar (actually even less after Wayne robs the box office). No explanation is given for Wayne's ripping off the riders and still being considered the hero who gets the girl. Things get complicated at this point because the villain (Al Ferguson) and his sidekick Larry Fine (played by Paul Fix-who would go on to play Sheriff Micah on television's "The Rifleman") see Wayne rob the box office and then steal the remainder of the money and kill the rodeo manager. Moe and Curly get blamed. So Moe and Curly move to another town to get away from the law and they change their names to Smith and Jones. Who do they meet first but their old friend Larry, whose sister becomes the 2nd half love interest (Senorita Rita is left behind it the old town and makes no further appearances in the movie). Larry's sister is nicely played by a radiantly beautiful Mary Kornman (now grown up but in her younger days she was one of the original cast members of Hal Roach's "Our Gang" shorts). Kornman is the main reason to watch the mega-lame western and her scenes with Moe and Curly are much better than any others in the production, as if they used an entirely different crew to film them. Even for 1935 the action sequences in this thing are extremely weak and the technical film- making is staggeringly bad. The two main chase scenes end with stock footage wide shots of a rider falling from a horse. Both times the editor cuts to a shot of one of the characters rolling on the ground, but there is no horse in the frame, the film stock is completely different, and the character has on different clothes than the stunt rider. There is liberal use of stock footage in other places, none of it even remotely convincing. One thing to watch for is a scene midway into the movie where Moe and Curly get on their horses and ride away (to screen right) from a cabin as the posse is galloping toward the cabin from the left. The cameraman follows the two stooges with a slow pan right and then does a whip pan to the left to reveal the approaching posse. Outside of home movies I have never seen anything like this, not because it is looks stupid (which it does) but because a competent director would never stage a scene in this manner. They would film the two riders leaving and then reposition the camera and film the posse approaching as a separate action. Or if they were feeling creative they would stage the sequence so the camera shows the riders in the foreground and the posse approaching in the background. Then again, what do I know? I'm only a child.