My most recent inexplicable quest is to track down and view the rarest of the Judy Canova film library. The story starts with the US Military launching a remote controlled atomic missile. German spies intercept the signal and try to control the missile, but their interference causes the missile to crash in the middle of a Nevada ghost town. The spies, led by Sig Rumann, and the US government set out to locate the missing missile.The only inhabitants of the Nevada ghost town are Judy and her grandpa, played by Andy Clyde. Clyde's grandpa is not too far from his California Carlson role which graced many Hopalong Cassidy features. Judy and Andy run a small train shuttle that connects to the big city. The missile lands right on their train's line causing their sleepy existence to be disturbed by US agents and foreign spies.One of the delights of the film for me was the teaming of Canova and Clyde which worked very well together. Their scenes are where the film really glides. It slows down during the romantic parts when a US agent (Ross Elliott) shows up to locate the missile and the German spies. The spy story is really much nonsense but leave it to old professionals Canova, Clyde and Rumann to pull it off.

My film group watched "Carolina Cannonball" because it was mentioned in the book "Keep Watching The Skies!" as part of the history of science fiction films in the 40s-late 60's. The "science fiction" content in this case is an errant "atomic powered missile" that goes missing and lands near the track where Judy Canova and her "grandad" are running a trolley (the "Cannonball" of the title) and for various reasons too complicated to go into, they swap out their boiler for the missile, and hilarity ensues. This one pretty much goes through the motions without any real oomph, although the actors work hard to sell the plot; there are also some decent sight gags and slapstick in a few places (along with plenty of stuff that falls flat). Judy, in her role as a hick/bumpkin/man starved country gal, actually sings three short numbers in the movie, and the songs are innocuous enough that they won't hurt or annoy the viewer very much. The rest of the time she moons over the handsome young government agent who has come to her deserted ghost town looking for the missile, plays off the three Commie "prospectors" who also are looking for the missile, chats with her "grandfather",cracks wise, and generally fills up screen time with stage business and rubber faces until time runs out. It's OK entertainment, but nothing you'd go out of your way to see these days. Call it the movie equivalent to one of the less funny "I Love Lucy" episodes.To be fair, the copy I saw was a terrible print, grainy and smeared black and white, which probably detracted some from its impact. I understand that Canova had a long and diverse film and radio career, and you can see why - this is her vehicle and she carries the film. Unfortunately, with material this underpowered, she can't carry it far enough. I will say in its defense, that "Carolina Cannonball" is quite a bit better than many bottom-of-the-bill features I've seen from that era.