The version I have has the re-release title of "Saddle & Spurs." Hoppy starts out dressed all in black, although later changes to an unflattering Buckskin suit & tie. There's a mysterious figure running about who resembles the 1940s "The Shadow." Very nice music soundtrack (probably borrowed from an earlier non-Hoppy film). Some good comedic lines, such as Hoppy to California: "The brown horse is yours." Earle Hodgins, who usually plays the snake-oil salesman type of character to perfection, is here cast out of character as a scruffy, bearded cowhand. Old Dark House elements abound: the wind blows the lights out in a big old house, at which time one of the beneficiaries of the will being read is killed, lots of people sneaking about at night, there's a secret passageway, there's a mounted buffalo head where someone is sneaking peeks into the next room, a mysterious voice at a gravesite, & so on. There's a long fight scene in the cellar that features fantastic camera angles & a very neat expressionistic set! Misplaced in a western, but great anyway! The heroine, played by Patricia Tate, is one of the prettiest in all the Hoppy films, but strangely, Lucky is not romantically interested in this young lady. A very good mystery western, but Western fans beware, Hoppy doesn't fire his gun at all in this film, despite being shot at twice. I rate it 7/10.
Review of Unexpected Guest
