''The Phantom Empire'' is a 1935 American

Western Western may refer to: Places *Western, Nebraska, a village in the US *Western, New York, a town in the US *Western Creek, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western Junction, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western world, countries that id ...

serial film A serial film, film serial (or just serial), movie serial, or chapter play, is a film, motion picture form popular during the first half of the 20th century, consisting of a series of short subjects exhibited in consecutive order at one theater ...

directed by

Otto Brower Otto Brower (December 2, 1890 – January 25, 1946) was an American film director. He directed more than 40 films between 1928 and 1946. He was born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and died in Hollywood, California, from a myocardial infarction, ...

and

B. Reeves Eason William Reeves Eason (October 2, 1886 – June 9, 1956), known as B. Reeves Eason, was an American film director, actor and screenwriter. His directorial output was limited mainly to low-budget westerns and action pictures, but it was as a secon ...

and starring

Gene Autry Orvon Grover "Gene" Autry (September 29, 1907 – October 2, 1998), nicknamed the Singing Cowboy, was an American singer, songwriter, actor, musician, rodeo performer, and baseball owner who gained fame largely by singing in a crooning s ...

Frankie Darro Frankie Darro (born Frank Johnson, Jr.; December 22, 1917 – December 25, 1976) was an American actor and later in his career a stuntman. He began his career as a child actor in silent films, progressed to lead roles and co-starring roles ...

, and Betsy King Ross.Magers 2007, p. 21. This 12-chapter

Mascot Pictures Mascot Pictures Corporation was an American film company of the 1920s and 1930s best known for producing and distributing film serials and B-westerns. Mascot was formed in 1927 by film producer Nat Levine. In 1936 it merged with several other ...

serial combined the Western,

musical Musical is the adjective of music. Musical may also refer to: * Musical theatre, a performance art that combines songs, spoken dialogue, acting and dance * Musical film and television, a genre of film and television that incorporates into the narr ...

and

fantasy Fantasy is a genre of speculative fiction involving Magic (supernatural), magical elements, typically set in a fictional universe and sometimes inspired by mythology and folklore. Its roots are in oral traditions, which then became fantasy ...

genres. The first episode is 30 minutes, the rest about 20 minutes. The serial film is about a

singing cowboy A singing cowboy was a subtype of the archetypal cowboy hero of early Western films. It references real-world campfire side ballads in the American frontier, the original cowboys sang of life on the trail with all the challenges, hardships, and d ...

who stumbles upon an ancient subterranean civilization living beneath his own ranch that becomes corrupted by unscrupulous greedy speculators from the surface. In 1940, a 70-minute feature film edited from the serial was released under the titles ''Radio Ranch'' or ''Men with Steel Faces''. This was Gene Autry's first starring role, playing himself as a singing cowboy.Magers 2007, p. 22.

Plot

Gene Autry (

) is a singing cowboy who runs Radio Ranch, a

dude ranch A guest ranch, also known as a dude ranch, is a type of ranch oriented towards visitors or tourism. It is considered a form of agritourism. History Guest ranches arose in response to the romanticization of the American West that began to occur ...

from which he makes a daily live radio broadcast at 2:00 pm. Gene has two kid sidekicks, Frankie Baxter (

) and Betsy Baxter ( Betsy King Ross), who lead a club, the Junior Thunder Riders, in which the kids play at being armored knights of an unknown civilization, the mysterious Thunder Riders who make a sound like thunder when they ride. The kids, dressing up in capes and water-bucket helmets, play at riding "To the rescue!" (their motto). A chance to become real heroes occurs when Betsy, Frankie, and Gene are kidnapped by the real Thunder Riders from the super-scientific underground empire of Murania, complete with towering buildings,

robot A robot is a machine—especially one programmable by a computer—capable of carrying out a complex series of actions automatically. A robot can be guided by an external control device, or the control may be embedded within. Robots may be c ...

s, ray-guns, advanced

television Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertisin ...

, elevator tubes that extend miles from the surface, and the icy, blonde, evil Queen Tika. On the surface, criminals led by Professor Beetson plan to invade Murania and seize its

radium Radium is a chemical element with the symbol Ra and atomic number 88. It is the sixth element in group 2 of the periodic table, also known as the alkaline earth metals. Pure radium is silvery-white, but it readily reacts with nitrogen (rather t ...

wealth, while in Murania, a group of revolutionaries plots to overthrow Queen Tika. The inhabitants of Murania are the lost tribe of Mu, who went underground in the last glacial period 100,000 years ago, and now live in a fantastically advanced city 25,000 feet below the surface. They cannot now breathe the air at ground level and must wear

oxygen mask An oxygen mask provides a method to transfer breathing oxygen gas from a storage tank to the lungs. Oxygen masks may cover only the nose and mouth (oral nasal mask) or the entire face (full-face mask). They may be made of plastic, silicone, or r ...

s. (Surface dwellers have no trouble breathing Muranian air.) The Thunder Guard emerges to the surface world from a cave with a huge rock door that swings up like a garage door. Both Muranians and Professor Beetson want to get rid of Autry, so he loses his radio contract and Radio Ranch is vacated.Magers 2007, pp. 23–24.

Cast

as Gene Autry, singing cowboy at the Radio Ranch *

as Frankie Baxter, one of Gene's sidekicks * Betsy King Ross as Betsy Baxter, one of Gene's sidekicks *

Dorothy Christy Dorothy Christy (born Dorothea J. Seltzer, later Dorothy Rucker; May 26, 1906 – May 21, 1977) was an American actress. She was sometimes billed as Dorothy Christie. Early years Christy was born Dorothea J. Seltzer on May 26, 1906, in Readin ...

as Queen Tika, the evil queen of Murania *

Wheeler Oakman Wheeler Oakman (born Vivian Eichelberger; February 21, 1890 – March 19, 1949) was an American film actor. Early years Oakman was born as Vivian Eichelberger in Washington, D.C., and educated in that city's schools. He grew up in Fairfax, Vir ...

as Lord Argo, the Muranian High Chancellor and leader of the rebels *

Charles K. French Charles K. French (born Charles Ekrauss French or Charles E. Krauss; January 17, 1860 – August 2, 1952) was an American film actor, screenwriter and director who appeared in more than 240 films between 1909 and 1945. Biography French was ...

as Mal *

Warner Richmond Warner Richmond (born Werner Paul Otto Raetzmann; January 11, 1886 – June 19, 1948) was an American stage and film actor. He began his career as a stock theatre actor and appeared in films in both the silent film and sound eras. His career spa ...

as Rab *

J. Frank Glendon J. Frank Glendon (October 25, 1886 – March 17, 1937) was an American film actor. He appeared in more than 70 films between 1915 and 1936. He was born in Choteau, Montana, and died in Hollywood, California. Selected filmography * '' Canni ...

as Professor Beetson, the villainous scientist after the land's radium deposits *

Smiley Burnette Lester Alvin Burnett (March 18, 1911 – February 16, 1967), better known as Smiley Burnette, was an American country music performer and a comedic actor in Western films and on radio and TV, playing sidekick to Gene Autry, Roy Rogers, a ...

as Oscar, comic relief * Peter Potter as Pete, comic relief * Edward Peil Sr. as Cooper * Jack Carlyle as Saunders

Production

Story

The idea for the plot came to writer

Wallace MacDonald Wallace Archibald MacDonald (5 May 1891 – 30 October 1978) was a Canadian silent film actor and film producer. Biography MacDonald was born in Mulgrave, Nova Scotia, Canada, and attended school in Sydney, Nova Scotia. He started as a mess ...

when he was under gas having a tooth extracted.Harmon 1972, pp. 61–62.

Filming and budget

''The Phantom Empire'' was filmed in late 1934. The film had an operating budget of $75,000 (equal to $ today). The budget was originally reported to have been "no more than" $100,000.

Filming locations

* Agoura Ranch, Agoura, California, USA *

Bronson Canyon Bronson Canyon, or Bronson Caves, is a section of Griffith Park in Los Angeles that has become known as a filming location for many films and television series, especially Westerns and science fiction, from the early days of motion pictures to th ...

, Griffith Park, 4730 Crystal Springs Drive, Los Angeles, California, USA *

Griffith Observatory Griffith Observatory is an observatory in Los Angeles, California on the south-facing slope of Mount Hollywood in Griffith Park. It commands a view of the Los Angeles Basin including Downtown Los Angeles to the southeast, Hollywood to the south, ...

, Griffith Park, 4730 Crystal Springs Drive, Los Angeles, California, USA * Iverson Ranch, 1 Iverson Lane, Chatsworth, Los Angeles, California, USA *

Keystone Studios Keystone Studios was an early film studio founded in Edendale, California (which is now a part of Echo Park) on July 4, 1912 as the Keystone Pictures Studio by Mack Sennett with backing from actor-writer Adam Kessel (1866–1946) and Charle ...

, 1712 Glendale Blvd., Silver Lake, Los Angeles, California, USA

Stuntwork

* Ken Cooper * Richard Talmadge * Jack Jones * George Magrill * Wally West Frankie Darro and Betsy King Ross did their own stunt riding in this serial. Ross was an experienced rodeo performer and was billed as the "World's Champion Trick Rider".

Soundtrack

* "Uncle Noah's Ark" (Gene Autry, Smiley Burnette, Nick Manoloff) by Gene Autry and band (chapter 1) * "

That Silver-Haired Daddy of Mine "That Silver Haired Daddy of Mine" was Gene Autry's first hit record in 1932, written and performed with fellow railroadman Jimmy Long. Thanks to his new career as a singing cowboy in 1935, it became one his biggest. Writing and recording Jimm ...

" (Gene Autry, Jimmy Long) by Gene Autry and band (chapter 1) * "I'm Oscar, I'm Pete" (Gene Autry, Smiley Burnette) by Gene Autry, Smiley Burnette, and William Moore (chapter 2) * "No Need to Worry" (Gene Autry, Smiley Burnette) by the Radio Rangers (chapter 4) * "Uncle Henry" (Gene Autry, Smiley Burnette) by Gene Autry (chapter 4) * "I'm Getting a Moon's Eye View of the World" (Gene Autry, Smiley Burnette) by Gene Autry (chapter 8) * "My Cross Eyed Gal" (Gene Autry, Jimmy Long) by the Radio Rangers (chapter 8) * "Just Come On Back" (Gene Autry, Smiley Burnette) by the Radio Rangers (chapter 8)

Chapter titles

# The Singing Cowboy # The Thunder Riders # The Lightning Chamber # Phantom Broadcast # Beneath the Earth # Disaster from the Skies # From Death to Life # Jaws of Jeopardy # Prisoner of the Ray # The Rebellion # A Queen in Chains # The End of Murania

Reception

''The Phantom Empire'' was released in theaters on February 23, 1935.Cline 1997, p. 212. The serial was a "marked box office success."

Cultural references

The 1979 television series ''

Cliffhangers A cliffhanger or cliffhanger ending is a plot device in fiction which features a main character in a precarious or difficult dilemma or confronted with a shocking revelation at the end of an episode or a film of serialized fiction. A cliffhang ...

'', which attempted to recreate the old movie serial feel by showing three serial chapters in each episode, included a serial titled "The Secret Empire", a pastiche of ''The Phantom Empire''. Events in the underground empire were shown in color, but events on the surface were "in glorious black and white". Stock footage from the serial and other serials was used in the animated series '' Muppet Babies''.

Fred Olen Ray Fred Olen Ray (born September 10, 1954) is an American film producer, director, and screenwriter of more than 200 low-to-medium-budget feature films in many genres, including Horror film, horror, science fiction, action film, action/adventure f ...

in 1988 filmed a movie called ''The Phantom Empire'' about treasure hunters braving a cavern system populated by troglodytes and other subterranean hazards to finally encounter an underground lost civilization. The movie makes reference to the serial and was itself in the end credits planned to have sequels that never were produced. Alejandro Pérez Cervantes' short story collection, ''Murania'', was inspired by the aesthetic of Murania and the lost continent of Mu as depicted in the film. It received the 2006 Julio Torri national award for short fiction in Mexico. The web series ''

The Sam Plenty Cavalcade of Action Show Plus Singing! ''The Jim Henson Company Presents The Sam Plenty Cavalcade of Action Show Plus Singing!''comic strip A comic strip is a sequence of drawings, often cartoons, arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often serialized, with text in balloons and captions. Traditionally, throughout the 20th and into the 21st ...

writer

Tom Batiuk Thomas Martin Batiuk (born March 14, 1947) is an American comic strip creator, best known for his long-running newspaper strip '' Funky Winkerbean''. Career Born in Akron, Ohio, Batiuk attended Kent State University, from which he graduated in ...

, and in tribute has been frequently referenced in his strips '' Funky Winkerbean'' and ''

Crankshaft A crankshaft is a mechanical component used in a piston engine to convert the reciprocating motion into rotational motion. The crankshaft is a rotating shaft containing one or more crankpins, that are driven by the pistons via the connecting ...

'', predominantly as the favorite film of ''Crankshaft'' character Jeff Murdoch. Most notably, one 2020 storyline in ''Funky'' saw Jeff and his grandson seeking refuge from a wildfire in the cave used for the film as the entrance to Murania, where they imagine being rescued by the Thunder Riders and taken into the city.

References

;Notes ;Citations ;Bibliography * * * * *

External links

* * * * (serial) * (69 minute version)
"Cowboys and Robots: The Birth of the Science Fiction Western" by Jeffrey Richardson

Roaring Rockets: The Phantom Empire!

Watch and Download the Entire Serial

"Gene Autry and the Phantom Empire" {{DEFAULTSORT:Phantom Empire, The 1935 films 1930s fantasy films American Western (genre) fantasy films American Western (genre) musical films American black-and-white films American fantasy films 1930s English-language films Films about the Hollow Earth Films directed by B. Reeves Eason Films directed by Otto Brower Films produced by Nat Levine Lost world films Mascot Pictures film serials 1930s American films