The Cockeyed Cowboys of Calico County Movie Download

7 / 10

“If you didn’t know who it is, you wouldn’t know who it was!”
Done in the same spirit as the ‘Over the Hill Gang’ Westerns, this one instead relies on a lot of traditionally non-Western genre character actors to spice up the comedy elements in the story. Bonanza’s Dan Blocker finds himself in the lead here in a somewhat characteristic role, that of a big lug with a soft spot in his heart for a gal he wants to marry. The story is similar to a Blocker made for TV movie from 1968 titled “Something for a Lonely Man”, in which his character is basically the same guy, but just a bit more oblivious to the frontier gal displaying her affection for him.

Whenever Charley Bicker (Blocker) isn’t on screen, the supporting players have a good time hamming it up, with Jim Backus, Mickey Rooney, Wally Cox and Noah Beery, Jr. leading the charge. Jack Elam flits in and out of the story as a hilarious blind gunslinger on the trail of a thousand dollar bounty for outlaw Panama Jack. The town folk come to rely on Kittrick (Elam) to run saloon gal Sadie’s (Nanette Fabray) suitor out of town to grease the skids for Bicker’s romance.

I got the biggest kick out of Mickey Rooney uttering some self deprecating lines as they relate to his own matrimonial history (married eight times!!!). The first time was when he saw the wrong mail order bride get off the train, stating that he ‘wanted one of those’. The better gag was when he offered to tell Charley about all the trouble he’s had with women. I bet that line dredged up a lot of memories, as he was with wife number seven at the time. I still can’t get over Ava Gardner being his first.

There are also a number of sight gags you’ll have to keep your eye out for. I liked the sign in the barber shop providing double duty with ‘Special Rates for Funerals’, along with the Calico saloon featuring ‘Whiskey – 10 cents; Good Whiskey – 15 cents’. What the heck, be a big spender for the extra nickel.

For all you Bonanza fans who couldn’t get enough of Hoss Cartwright, this is an entertaining family Western which manages to sidestep the issue of saloon gal Sadie’s real profession; at one point she calls herself a dance hall singer and dancer. She fesses up to her shady history with Charley in a later scene by referencing her ‘bad’ past, but it gets glossed over pretty quickly with Charley’s blasé attitude. Sadie keeps Charley and the viewer up in the air about what she’ll really do when it comes to walking down the aisle, but if you’ve seen enough of these kinds of stories, there’s only one way it could turn out. And it does.Read More