The Bronze Buckaroo (1939) User Reviews

"That guy's poison, you oughta let me kill him!"

[classicsoncall · 5/10 · 14 July 2016]

I'd been waiting a while now for this one to come around on TCM and the other night I was rewarded for my patience. This film is the middle entry of three movies by black singing cowboy Herb Jeffries (billed here as Herbert Jeffrey), in which he portrays the character Bob Blake. In terms of plot, it's virtually identical to "Two Gun Man From Harlem", in that it involves Blake and his partners going up against a villain who wants to swindle a woman and her brother out of their ranch land. In both stories the baddie had the siblings' father killed.

A humorous gimmick runs throughout the story whereby Blake's main sidekick Dusty (Lucius Brooks) gets hoodwinked by ventriloquist Slim (F.E. Miller) into buying a twelve dollar mule. Dusty's luck runs about the same the rest of the way, at one point he literally loses his shirt, and it looked like everything else, to a crooked card sharp. The ventriloquism gag comes into play one more time in the film's finale, resulting in an abrupt but successful shootout between the good guys and the bad guys.

There's an interesting scene early in the story when Blake and his pals enter a saloon full of black cowboys and it sounds like the entire assemblage breaks into song. However if you watch any of the cowhands as the camera pans the tables, you won't see any of them singing. I would imagine the chores were handled by the credited Four Tones who side-kicked Blake in the film, along with unseen back-ups off screen. At least it sure sounded to me like a hall full of singers!

If your approach to these pictures is one in which expectations run high for a thrilling shoot 'em up, one is bound to be disappointed. The novelty here is in watching an all black cast Western led by the versatile Herb Jeffries, a crooner that could have held his own with the likes of Roy Rogers, Gene Autry and Eddie Dean. In fact, Jeffries' talent was such that he chose to pass on a few more planned pictures after completing "Harlem Rides the Range", he signed up with the Duke Ellington Band shortly after.

One final thought occurred to me as I took a look at my reviews of the other two Jeffries' films I mentioned. It turns out in "Two Gun Man From Harlem", his character Bob Blake wore only one gun! But here he's wearing two, so it seems to me they could have reversed the titles and they would have been all set!

The Bronze Buckaroo was an interesting early race western musical

[tavm · 4/10 · 17 July 2008]

Looking at the remaining list of race movies in the DVD set, "Black Entertainmint in Film", I decided to check out Bronze Buckaroo since it's one of the shortest at 56 min. The plot is a familiar one that dominated many a singing cowboy pic with Buck Thorne (Clarence Brooks) and his henchman Pete (Spencer Williams) hoping to take a ranch from Joe Jackson and his sister Betty (Artie Young) after killing their father. Bob Blake (Herb Jeffries), a friend of Joe, arrives to help find him after he disappears. There's also his sidekick Dusty (Lucius Brooks) along for the ride and a con man named Slim Perkins (F. E. Miller) who provides some amusement with Dusty when he sells him a "talking" mule and plays crooked poker with him. To tell the truth, the movie had some scratches that made it hard to hear some of the dialogue and some of the gun sequences, which is always filmed in medium shot, aren't very exciting. Still, this was pretty entertaining and I loved The Four Tones' (of which Mr. Lucius Brooks was a part of) singing when we first arrived at the bar just before the first shootout. So on that note, The Bronze Buckaroo is worth a look. P.S. The director, Richard C. Kahn, was born in my current home state of Louisiana in New Orleans and the star, Mr. Jeffries, briefly lived in my birth town of Chicago where one of the clubs he performed in was allegedly owned by Al Copone. And as I noted in my comments for The Blood of Jesus, Mr. Williams was born in Vidalia, La.

director's own story is more interesting than the plot.

[ksf-2 · 6/10 · 16 March 2024]

Herb jeffries is blake, who goes looking for joe jackson, who has gone missing. But jackson's sister hasn't seen him lately, either. A silly, early use of ventriloquism by slim, who uses it to his own gain. The story doesn't really make much sense, but it's historical for several reasons. It was written and directed by richard kahn. He was caucasian, but often worked with all black casts, according to wikipedia dot org. This was a short-ish, feature film from hollywood pictures, at only fifty eight minutes. Some scenes filmed at victorville california, in the high desert. A couple songs from "the four tones". Some information on the web site second hand songs dot com, but not a lot of information on them anywhere. The sound quality is pretty bad. Lots of hiss and static, for most of the film. It appears that some of kahn's films didn't survive, so we're lucky to have this one in any condition! It's okay. Interesting more from a historical point of view than the storyline.

Low-key fun on the range

[Sleepy-17 · 3 June 2002]

Not much of a plot and no suspense, but a genial western with an all-Black cast. Great vaudeville comedy about a talking mule fills in the gaps between a few standard shoot-em-up scenes. Bizarre and wonderful scenes in a bar-room when the entire cast bursts into song. Very inexpensive with wildly uneven acting styles and strangely-staged fist-fights. Amusing but insignificant except as an introduction to suave Black cowboy Herb Jeffries.

Mildy interesting, it's still a bad film.

[planktonrules · 2/10 · 2 October 2013]

Back in the old days, movie theaters in the United States were often segregated or blacks had to go to different movie houses to see films. Not surprisingly, this led to black entrepreneurs deciding to make their own films--with black casts and film crew. Unfortunately, these films were plagued by horribly small budgets. Plus, many of these people simply weren't professionals...and in "The Bronze Buckaroo" it shows. Despite a decent performance by Herb Jeffries, the movie has so many strikes against it, today it's mostly of historical interest.

The film begins with Bob Blake (Jeffries) and his friends heading to the ranch of a friend, Joe Jackson. However, when they arrive, they learn from Jackson's sister that he's been missing for weeks. Soon, when some local thugs (led by Spencer Williams*) begin trying to stir up trouble, it's pretty certain these jerks are behind it. But who would kidnap Jackson and why? Well, it's up to Blake to handle it--pretty much by himself. In fact, in one rather dumb scene, he enters the headquarters of these guys and takes them on all by himself. Fortunately for realism sake, they soon beat the tar out of him! So is there anything I enjoyed about the film? Well, some of the comic relief did make me laugh--even though it was incredibly low-brow. One sharpie has learned ventriloquism and has convinced one of Blake's men that his mule can talk! Some might object to this, as it does tend to reinforce the notion of black inferiority to some viewers. Regardless, I laughed. On the other hand, I cannot ignore the terrible acting. Several of the 'actors' really had trouble reciting their lines (such as 'Uncle')--it was almost like watching a 3rd grade pageant, the acting was that bad.

*Williams generally played heavies in the 30s and 40s. However, today he's known as Amos from the "Amos 'n Andy" television show.

Excellent Movie!

[maceot · 10/10 · 16 April 2017]

"Bronze Buckeroo" is an excellent movie! I thoroughly enjoyed the entire casts! Specifically, Herbert Jeffrey! I saw him as a fictional version of Bass Reeves and Antonio Maceo combined. He was smart, articulate and intrepid! A very dashing, handsome protagonist! If you know the story of Bass Reeves, you know that he road a big white horse and carried two guns.

Regarding the great Antonio Maceo, Antonio Maceo was a very dashing and handsome man. He was referred to as " The Bronze Titan.

I also liked the supporting characters. Especially the two guys that were buddies. Both were funny, yet they were not the illiterate, mindless Negroes depicted in many stereotypical movies. There was also a plot and the movie culminated with the objective of that plot. "Bronze Buckeroo" was an excellent movie! See it for yourself!

Fair Western

[Michael_Elliott · 5 December 2016]

The Bronze Buckaroo (1939)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Bob Blake (Herb Jeffries) and his gang show up at their friends ranch and learn that he is missing. The man's sister gives them a few clues so they head out to try and locate their friend and before long they realize that the crooked Pete (Spencer Williams) had something to do with it.

THE BRONZE BUCKAROO will be of main interest to fans of the early "race" movies that were popular among black crowds back in the day. These movies were made to show in black theaters where directors and producers felt they could reach a select audience. These films were usually copies of something more popular and made with very small budgets.

This film here is a pretty standard Western as the story itself had been seen dozens if not hundreds of times already. Of course, a piece of property is behind everything going on and the film basically takes us through the numbers as we get a few bar fights, some horse races and of course an eventual showdown between the hero and villain.

The main draw here is getting to see Williams play a bad guy and for the most part he's good. I thought Jeffries was good in the lead role as well. At just under a hour this is a decent watch but just don't expect anything too ground-breaking.