Hell Hounds of the Plains

Hell Hounds of the Plains (1926) stars Yakima Canutt as Deputy Yak Hammond with the fetching Neva Gerba as his romantic interest. Yak was in the lead role rather than a stuntman and/or supporting character that he later specialized in. Supposedly he had voice problems that kept him from playing the lead in talkies. It is a fair oater, with Yak busting up a gang of horse thieves led by his girlfriend's brother, much to the chagrin of her upstanding paw when the varmint's identity was revealed at the end of the movie. Double irony, as the prospective father-in-law had made catching the gang's leader a precondition to giving Yak his daughter's hand in marriage. Features a great knock-down drag-out fist fight between Yak and the villain, and Yak was the man who invented the realistic movie slug fest. The film also offers a fine performance by Yak's mount, Boy the Wonder Horse, who scrambles down ravine walls, jumps off cliffs and dives into the water with or without Yak aboard.