Red River Range (1938)

Rustlers equipped with refrigerated trucks kill the cattle right after they have stolen it and transport it away so nobody can trace the animals. The folks at one small town ask for help from the government and three agents are sent over. One of them switches places en route with a friend of theirs, so that he can infiltrate the gang, who is operating from a dude ranch where the guests themselves unwittingly help the robbers as part of one of the ranch's leisure activities.

Routine B-Western with a plot which was apparently partly stolen from Public Cowboy #1 (1937) (I never watched it but was tipped off by IMDB commenter stevehaynie). The dialogue has some witty lines, which one or more devoted fans have inserted on the IMDB page's Quotes section. The funniest one is the last, which by today's standards might be considered a little sexist (but, mind you, two of the film's three writers were women). Aside from that, another noteworthy aspect of the film were the tandem identity covers as pointed out by one Stuart Galbraith IV in his review of the Blu Ray release:

"Tex has been identified by the rustlers, so Stony hatches an impressive triple-undercover-switcheroo: Tex will pretend to be Stony, while Stony works undercover, masquerading as an escaped outlaw named "Killer" Madigan, who in turn is hiding from the law as tenderfoot Jack Benson, a guest at a local dude ranch. Whew!"

Galbraith also quotes one character as saying (about the consequences of the rustling spree):

"Beef prices have hit rock-bottom!"

Contrarywise, IMDB commenter bkoganbing remarks:

"That in itself was an interesting aspect of this film, the inflation of meat prices as a result of cattle rustling. One never does think of the economic hurt, those rustlers cause."

So, which one is it: prices go up or prices go down? At least one character thinks it is the latter. I am no economist, but it seems, on a superficial analysis, that the shortage of beef would cause the prices to soar, not to "hit rock-bottom". On further thought, though, would there be any shortage? The rustlers' beef would end up being sold too, and, being of illegal origin, it is likely to be sold at smaller prices than the legitimate one; that in turn would reduce the latter's price. Of course, there is always the possibility that the stolen meat was going to be sold at another place with no trading connection with the region in which it was stolen.

Rating: 32

Depois Eu Conto (1956)

José, a gas station employee, passes off as a rich businessman from a traditional family in order to romance a socialite's daughter. His childhood girlfriend gets jealous. Her aunt sides with her and denounces him. That aunt is a wannabe singer who is made a mockery of in a performance at a posh nightclub. José finds comic potential in her and decides to open a nightclub at a favela (very poor community generally built in a hillside area) where she and other performers connected with popular culture would have their space.

Musical comedy which makes fun of socialites and social columnism. It's very dated, and the humor is unsophisticated, but the dialogue is vivacious and not wholly devoid of social observation.

Rating: 33

Nudista à Força (1966)

*spoilers below*
A decadent opera singer is giving a solo concert in São Paulo. Her henpecked husband is her accompanying pianist. After the concert, they head for the airport to catch a flight to Rio de Janeiro. At that time, a counterfeiter who happens to be an exact lookalike of the singer's husband is arriving from Argentina. The Interpol is after him, and he knows it. Instead of boarding the plane for Rio de Janeiro, where his contact would lead him to some absconded money printing plates, he wanders through São Paulo with the intention of misleading his chasers. However, one member of the police team mistakenly follows his lookalike to Rio de Janeiro. Aboard the plane, he befriends the opera singer's young daughter. Meanwhile, the counterfeiter gets hit by a car in a street of São Paulo, and is taken to the hospital, where he is put under permanent police surveillance. At the Rio de Janeiro airport, the singer's husband is mistaken for the criminal by the latter's associates (the leader of which is the criminal's girlfriend), is forcefully dragged into a car and taken to their hideout. At the hospital in São Paulo, the criminal escapes through the hospital's window. After some more incidents, all of them find themselves at a nudist club, which is where the printing plates are buried.
*end of spoilers*

Mediocre comedy whose only relatively noteworthy aspect is the presence of a well known (at the time) comedian at a dual role, one of which is played straight, and the other comically. His comical style strongly relied on his singular face and the grimaces he was able to produce. The writer and director is the prolific Victor Lima (1920-1981), who, according to IMDB, directed 37 movies, wrote (or co-wrote) 57, and apparently does not have a single photo of him appearing anywhere on the Internet. In 1966 alone, when this film was made, he made four movies (or had them released). This movie has a stronger stylistic kinship to the commercial French cinema of the time than to the American one.

Rating: 31

Copper Canyon (1950)

The action is set at a mining town, where a Southern ex-colonel has assumed a new identity and earns a living as a stage sharpshooter. The town is ruled by hoodlums who give Southern miners a hard time. The local smelter doesn't help either, refusing to smelt those Southern miners' ore -- he hates Southerners because his son was killed in the Civil War while fighting for the North. Thus, the Southern miners are forced to travel to another town in order to get their ore smelted. The road is full of dangers, though, what with the aforementioned hoodlums plottting to rob and even kill them sometimes. A group of Southerners approach the ex-colonel for help, but he refuses and does not even admit to his real identity. A lady gambler at the local saloon who is employed by the same man who has the sheriff and his deputies in his payroll wants to get rich but violence is not part of her agreement. She soon falls for the ex-colonel.

As is evident by the above synopsis, there are a lot of characters in this Western (and I didn't even mention the Lieutenant who is after the ex-colonel for the theft of Northern money). Everything is professionally done, but there is nothing memorable about it, and the plot has the convenient melodramatic accommodations which sacrifice plausibility for the sake of plot. It feels like a B-Western script grafted onto an A-production.

Rating: 47

Mulheres à Vista (1959)

A theatrical impresario tries to raise money for a show. He buys things in installments from shops and sells them on the street for payment upfront. He comes short of the amount he needs, though. He starts courting a rich widow who, it later turns out, owns the theater house and is willing to sponsor the show.

Musical comedy with lots of musical numbers (all of them rather bland and unmemorable) and a comicity mostly aimed at undemanding audiences. It may amuse one who is not looking for sophistication.

Rating: 32

Nueve reinas (2000)

English title: Nine Queens

Marcos is a veteran con artist whose partner is missing. He meets a younger con artist and takes him as a partner. The two try to deceive a rich foreigner into buying a forgery of a valuable set of stamps. The foreigner is leaving the country the next day.

Entertaining criminal drama with an engaging plot and fairly well defined characters. It never really transcends the superficial level of a nicely told story, though. Don't come looking for emotional depth or philosophical insight, or you will be disappointed. The following review from an IMDB user points out some plot weaknesses:

[begin quote]
A great film, but a Hollywood ending
msstone96822 January 2005
Warning: Spoilers
I find it hard to believe they could have gotten a plot that grandiose off the ground in a single day, what with all the other players who were in on it. I think they changed from an otherwise flawless plot to wit......

1. In the original ending, Vidal was the one who was sold either real or fake stamps and had to pay by cashier's check due to the difficulty of arranging large amounts of cash in a single day. So Vidal was not in on it, but in fact the source of a lot more than Marcos's $200,000. I can get along with the notion of having to pay with a bank check and also that both Juan and Marcos probably keep all their assets in easily accessible cash, explaining how the sale could go ahead in a day. Sandler's sister was not in on it either -- and her scene was great either way.

2. That they probably had an ending in which both Juan and Marcos were planning to con each other out of the entire amount, but before receiving the cash, the bank had failed, thereby leaving them both in an unhappy ending that nevertheless had a twist -- that the con was real and successful, but they lost the money due to unforeseen circumstances.

The movie allowed me to suspend my disbelief right up to the ending - either one or the other was setting it up, but there remained the possibility that they were both having an extraordinary day and opportunity and just couldn't walk away in spite of all the red flags. But an unhappy ending is usually too somber for the people charged with trying to sell films to handle, so they probably re-wrote or re-shot the final scene, which encompasses almost all of the film's implausibilities, to wit....

+ about 10 people seem to be happy to share Marcos's measly $200,000 among themselves, as if this was a con not to make any money, but to "win one for the team."

+ Valeria is happy to share out most of the money she was suing Marcos for. If she was really appalled about being conned by her own brother out of the inheritance, would she then get involved with several experienced con-artists just to get him to lose her money to them?

+ Would they have been able in one day to fake a news article about a high-profile guy being deported in a high-profile way the next day? Or are we supposed to believe that someone was able to check into the hotel, impersonating Vidal all the way up to the moment he surrenders to the authorities? No, sorry, I think Vidal was originally a real buyer, not in on the con. I also don't think they originally had that "polvo" stuff about Marcos's sister (would you send your sister with the real stamps into his room and wait for your money all night? Not even if it was a legitimate sale and you were totally naive would you or anyone else do that, much less so a cynical con-man.)

The movie's got all the stuff you want to enjoy the ride: characters, slang dialog, action, Buenos Aires, right up to that last quarter hour: Cut off that ending, leave most of the supporting actors out of the main con, and put in another 10 min in which each of Juan and Marcos tries a last minute and unsuccessful scam on the other, only to soon find that they'll never cash the check, and you've got the original story.

But instead we got a really "cute" skin-grafted-on ending where the proper birthright is restored (literally), the "guy gets the girl" and viewers get a feel-good distinction between good and evil: the "good" con-artists restore cosmic harmony and triumph over the "evil" one who has crossed some kind of moral line and brought disrepute to their profession.

Another great idea crashes on the rocks of the banal ending.
[end quote]

I agree with all of msstone's considerations (here's the link to that review)

Rating: 60

Night of the Creeps (1986)

Second viewing; first viewing with the original audio; previously seen dubbed in Portuguese on May 18, 1996.

In 1959, a canister from outer space lands on Earth, releasing strange wormlike creatures. A college student swallows one of those creatures just before he is killed by a mad man. His body is cryogenically preserved until 1986, when it is unfrozen by another college student who was looking for a corpse as part of a task he had to perform in order to join a fraternity. The corpse turns into a zombie who ends up releasing the creatures again.

Feeble attempt at emulating 1950s and 1960s horror and sci-fi b-movies. It is neither an out-and-out parody nor a seriously scary horror film. It's not exactly painful to watch, but has little in the way of a really interesting take on older movies.

Rating: 35 (down from 45)

As Aventuras de Pedro Malasartes (1960)

Based on traditional Brazilian and Portuguese folk stories (possibly derived from even older stories from other places, dating as far back as the 13th century).

*spoilers below*
Pedro Malasartes is cheated out of his inheritance by his brothers, being left with only a goose and a saucepan. He decides to roam the world; he leaves his girlfriend behind, much to her chagrin. She goes after him. On the way he finds a series of homeless children which join him in his wanderings. He tricks a man into buying his saucepan by claiming it has the power of cooking without fire. Then, he approaches a house and spies through a window; he sees the owner's wife hide her brother inside a cabinet just before the arrival of her husband; she puts the meal which she had served her brother in a cabinet drawer. Outside by the window, her husband surprises Pedro, who asks for some food. The owner agrees and invites Pedro inside the house. Pedro claims his goose has the power of speech and also of making things and even people appear at certain places. The animal honks and Pedro says it is saying that there is food is in the cabinet's drawer; the animal honks again and conjures a man inside the cabinet. Pedro tricks the house owner into buying the goose. Pedro unsuccessfully tries to find an intern school that would accept the children; they all require payment, and he cannot afford it. After a while, both the man who bought the saucepan and the one who bought the goose realize they have been deceived and go after Pedro. They get together on the road, and are joined by Pedro's girlfriend; they succeed in capturing Pedro. After putting him in a cloth sack, they take him to a police station. Another man appears there to complain about Pedro. It is a farmer who had hired Pedro as a pig keeper. Pedro sold his pigs and deceived him by sticking the pig's tails, which he had cut, in the mud, and then telling the farmer that the pigs were buried there. (The events at that farm are not shown in the movie; I do not know if this is due to missing footage; I think not). Outside the police station, Pedro, inside the sack, keeps yelling: "I don't want to marry the king's daughter!". A man approaches and Pedro tricks him into switching places with him by making him assume he will now be the one who will marry the king's daughter. On the road again, and reunited with his bunch of kids, Pedro makes other two victims: he sells them a money tree (actually an ordinary one on which he had hung a few money bills of little value). Pedro is eventually arrested and put on trial. He sweet talks the jury into acquitting him. His accompanying children are placed in an orphanage. Pedro gets a job at the orphanage so he can be near his little friends, who grew very fond of him. He has to agree to marry his girlfriend, and promise never to deceive people again. Moments later, however, as he walks with one of the the orphanage's friars, Pedro draws his ear near a small hole in the ground. Through it, he claims, one could hear the mass said in Rome. Would the friar be interested in buying it?
*end of spoilers*

Although marred by the usual structure that was the main comedian's stock-in-trade -- abundant sentimentality, mediocre musical numbers, simple-minded humor -- the source material is interesting and authentically popular in origin.

Rating: 33

The Missouri Breaks (1976)

Second viewing; previously viewed between 1983 and 1986.

In late 19th century Montana, a rancher hires an assassin to take care of cattle and horse thieves. The romance between the leader of a gang of horse thieves -- who buys a ranch next door the aforementioned rancher -- and the latter's unmarried daughter is one of the subplots. The assassin's suspicion, and subsequent persecution, of the gang is another. An incursion into Canada by the other gang members, who want to steal horses from the Mounties, makes up the remainder of the stuff this film is made of.

Artistically made Western, with a completely unbelievable plot (an outlaw who chooses a risky place to live just for a silly revenge is something you will not see in real life) and a completely anachronistic romance. The outlaws are nice people here, the honest folks are disgusting, and the "justice system", in the person of the hired gun, is psychopathic.

Rating: 66 (unchanged)

That Night in Rio (1941)

A variety theater troupe from the U.S. is performing in Rio de Janeiro. The main actor does an impression of a local magnate, of whom he is a lookalike. Said magnate takes a loss at an investment he made; the problem is that he used money from his bank in the investment, and now he must get a loan to restore the money to the bank before the current account holders find out about it. While he is away, his two assistants must conceal his absence during a party and to that effect they hire the abovementioned American actor. The latter sees in it an opportunity to make some money and also to flirt with the magnate's wife. Meanwhile, the actor's jealous girlfriend, who happens to be Brazilian, manages to get invited to the party.

This is a several-times filmed play about lookalikes and the confusion they entail. The plot explores the progressive complexity of situations engendered by mistaken identities. All that is not without interest or entertainment value. The musical numbers are just so-so; they are poorly placed in the film, too, sometimes following one another without interruption, which gets a little monotonous.

Rating: 40