Opening with quite a bit of stock footage, some of which dates back to the silent era, PRC's color western Wild West is a moderately entertaining music oater and the third and last to team the sometimes awkward Eddie Dean with the more kinetic Al "Lash" la Rue. Dean sings his songs in the prescribed matter and doesn't lose his hat in the clinches with Terry Frost and his gang. La Rue, whose resemblance to a young Humphrey Bogart is more startling than ever, cracks his trademark whip a couple of times, at one point catching a severely overweight Bud Osborne, and Roscoe Ates keeps his stammer to a minimum. Louise Currie and Jean Carlin add a bit of feminine appeal to the proceedings but have very little to do with the general plot. The girls are offered even less screen time in the truncated 1948 black and white version of the film, re-titled Prairie Outlaws. All but one of the songs are also gone and the plot seems hurried at times. The recycled version, however, added a prologue in which Dean and Ates are seen driving their cattle to market, the third hero, La Rue, suddenly appearing on the scene with no explanation. Presumably, Prairie Outlaws was quickly assembled to cash in on La Rue's newfound popularity. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, Rovi
