Yawn. Poorly Filmed Snooze Fest.

Plot so thin, it passes unnoticed.

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Very good movie overall, highly recommended. Most of the negative reviews don't have any merit and are all pollitically based. Give this movie a chance at least, and it might give you a different perspective.

Well you've heard it said before, if something sounds too good to be true, it usually is. In this case, flooded out landowners are offered the opportunity for 'Free Ranches - No Money Down - Twenty Years to Pay' by the unscrupulous Phineas T. Flagg (Kenneth Harlan) if they pack up and head for Gunsmoke Valley, Arizona. Right off the bat, the terms 'free' and 'twenty years to pay' seem mutually exclusive, but what the heck, you've got to have a story in here somewhere.For Three Mesquiteers fans, this one also offers a bit of a head scratcher when Lullaby Joslin (Max Terhune) walks into a general store and buys his dummy Elmer, seemingly for the first time. Actually, Elmer was around since their first picture, even if Terhune wasn't. Syd Saylor portrayed Lullaby in the very first Mesquiteers film, and was then replaced by Terhune for a very long stretch of twenty one pictures. "Gunsmoke Ranch" was the sixth film in the fifty one movie franchise.Besides Lullaby and Elmer, there was some additional comic relief provided here by a couple of characters named Oscar and Elmer Twiddlebaum, though one might question their effectiveness. Oscar (Ed Platt) was just plain hokey, and Elmer (Lou Fulton) did a stuttering gimmick that appears rather demeaning today. I couldn't help thinking that Elmer might have been the inspiration for Warner Brothers' Porky Pig; if you close your eyes and listen you'd swear you were hearing the cartoon.For all their trouble in trying to warn the newly arrived citizens of Gunsmoke Valley, you would think the Mesquiteers would have been given a warm reception, but instead, the town folk stand by their benefactor Flagg. It'll take at least another half hour for the boys to whip things into gear to save the new town of Three Score and Ten from their own intransigence. It all comes to a head in a fairly wild finale with your traditional shoot 'em up and some well staged action sequences. B Western fans will recognize the guiding hand of Yakima Canutt behind the exciting stunt work, who also doubles as Flagg henchman Spider.

I've seen a lot of the Three Mesquiteers films--especially the ones starring Livingston, Corrigan and Terhune. So, I know that their films can certainly be better than this one. However, two big problems made this tough viewing. One is Elmer. No, I am not talking about Terhune's ventriloquist dummy by the same name (though he was always an unwelcome addition to their films), but a guy whose act is to do the most annoying and unfunny stuttering acts you could possibly see and hear. The guy stuttered MUCH worse than Porky Pig and it seemed cruel and unfunny--and completely unnecessary to the film. Second, the towns people were just too dumb--way too dumb.The film begins with lots of stock footage of flooding. The film concerns a group of folks who lost everything in these storms. A benefactor comes forward and offers to take them all out West to a new community he's building--and all at very, very low prices. But the guy is really a land swindler--and he's done it before and it's obvious he's about to do it again. When the perennial do-gooders, the Mesquiteers, find out, they go to warn the folks--who immediately mistreat them and treat them like lepers. Why, then, did the trio stay and help them out when they realized they were being swindled?! I felt that this was handled VERY poorly. The townsfolk reaction was bizarre and the Mesquiteers reaction to this was also quite odd. Still, if you love these films, this one is worth seeing and rather typical--but certainly more flawed than usual. If you aren't a fan...steer clear!

These B-westerns were a staple of my diet as a kid growing up in the 40s and even the 1950's. We played outside all the time and there was no T.V. to watch so the movies became Radio come to life. We could see the action and not just hear it. Cowboys weren't that far fetched in those days as lots of large ranches were still running beef cattle in the western states so to see cowboys on the screen was to live the life. Mostly old timers like myself will enjoy Gunsmoke Ranch but if you sit down with your grandchild (and they are young enough) to watch don't be surprised if they like it too. Don't be too critical and remember this little studio made this on a very small budget.

This 'Three Mesquiteers' feature is a fair B-Western, rather routine, and with quite a low-budget look to it, but watchable. It has generally likable, if ordinary, characters, and the story holds some interest. It has some lighter moments and just enough action to keep it moving along.The story has the 'Mesquiteers' running across a new town that is being built to help out some settlers who have been displaced by a flood. The trio start to suspect that something might not be what it seems, so they stick around to look into things, and the action proceeds from there, with some occasional humor (much of it from Max Terhune). Some of it works, and some of it doesn't really come off. Overall, there's not too much that's either especially good or especially bad about this one.