Roy Rogers becomes entangled in murder and larceny after his friends (Andy Devine) and singing ranchers (Foy Willing and the Riders of the Purple Sage) invest $20,000 in a seeming worthless silver mine. When an old prospector who might know where the silver is located disappears, Roy suspects that the project's mining engineer (Robert Livingston) could be behind it. Seeking proof of a crime, Roy's investigation becomes even more complicated when the mine owner's secretary masquerading as his daughter (Jane Frazee) arrives in town. In a case of mistaken intentions Frazee constantly thwarts Roy's attempts to bring the bad guys to justice.The ghost town set and dark abandoned hotel form the stage for this action oater. Roy's nine pictures with Andy Devine marked a real difference in style from earlier movies. Andy was brought in after Gabby Hayes left the series in 1946. While Andy still provided comic relief, the villains grew more ruthless and Roy sang less. Here there are only three pretty good non-action stopping tunes in the movie. Comedy of Errors inspired sequence in the spooky hotel about halfway through seems a little out of sync with the rest of the movie.Originally filmed in "Trucolor", seemingly only the black and white prints remain on this one. Unfortunately as with a lot of the later Roy Rogers movies, this one was later chopped to bits to reduce the runtime from 67 minutes down to 54 to fit for television. Good news here is that unlike a few of Roy's other movies where the chopped footage appears lost forever, Grand Canyon Trail can still be found intact in the full length version. For Roy Rogers Fans it's worth the effort to find to 67 minute unedited format.Pretty decent Roy Rogers flick. 6 of 10*

I'd have to say that this was a little embarrassing for the 'King of the Cowboys'; made in 1948, the picture came out a decade after Roy Rogers' earliest pictures in which he had a starring role. Roy's character comes off as a bit clueless in this one, along with his female co-star Jane Frazee, who alternates her allegiance between Roy and Robert Livingston, portraying chief bad guy Bill Regan. The whole story seems kind of muddled, with missed opportunities for what could have been an entertaining hour or so. Like the legend of the 'Hangman's Hotel' for example, which says the hanged man comes to life at midnight. With Andy Devine in the cast as Cookie Bullfincher, you would think the story would get a little mileage out of that set up. Instead, you have some convoluted proceedings that would have been better served if this had been a Bowery Boys flick. It was a sad attempt at a haunted hotel gimmick that relied on poor old Genevieve, who truth be told, wound up getting more screen time than Trigger, who's contract as 'Smartest Horse in the Movies' didn't have anything to say about getting upstaged by a mule. And then you have Foy Willing and his Riders of the Purple Sage replacing Bob Nolan and the Sons of the Pioneers for your musical interlude. I don't know about you, but it was already half way into the picture and I was still looking for Pat Brady - oh well! Yet there was still an interesting element to be found here if you were looking hard enough, and that turned out to be Roy's athletic dismount of Trigger while still on the run from the bad guys. OK, it was probably a stunt double, but I haven't seen that one before in a couple hundred Westerns.Jane Frazee does the honors as the female lead in this picture, as she would in four other films opposite Roy in the 1947/1948 time frame. In "Under California Stars", she appeared as Andy Devine's cousin, appropriately named Caroline Bullfincher. You're never quite convinced what side she'll come in on in this story though, since she starts out pretending to be someone she's not, and winds up on the good guy side almost by accident.Fans of the old Laurel and Hardy films might be as surprised as I was to see James Finlayson here as the Sheriff of Sintown. I would have liked a little more comedy relief written into his role, but he played it pretty straight after all. I had to wonder, when it was all over, why he and old Vanderpool (Charle Coleman) wound up in the mine shaft with Cookie when there was no reason for that to be. Just a way to close it out I guess, with about as much thought as went into the rest of the picture. I hate to be that harsh, but if you've seen enough Roy Rogers flicks, you've got to know that this was not one of his finer efforts.Say, Sintown - I wonder if that's the same place that grew up to be Sin City?

Roy Rogers and company try to bring "Sintown" back to life - it's a ghost town which may go boom if silver mining is successful. Andy Devine (as "Cookie") slapsticks around. Jane Frazee (as Carol) loses a piece of her bitches to Mr. Rogers' sharp leer. Foy Willing and the Riders of the Purple Sage stand-in (or, is that sing-in?) for the A.W.O.L. Bob Nolan and the Sons of the Pioneers. James Finlayson (from the Laurel and Hardy films) adds to the "slapstick" look of "Grand Canyon Trail". A loose floor board delivers the winning comedy performance. Mr. Devine's mule kicks its heels. There are energetic human performances, too - but, the material isn't Grand. ** Grand Canyon Trail (1948) William Witney ~ Roy Rogers, Jane Frazee, Andy Devine

While it's probably just average among the many Roy Rogers features, there's enough action in "Grand Canyon Trail" to make it worth watching. The story is pretty thin this time. What there is of it has Roy, Andy Devine, and a spunky but sometimes misguided heroine battling the bad guys over a silver mine, while also having to deal with the usual dull-witted sheriff (played by an old silent comedy favorite, James Finlayson). There's also a supposedly haunted hotel that is mainly played for a few laughs, most of them at the expense of Divine's character. It does not always fit together as well as it could have, but there is plenty of action, plus a couple of songs, and it has pretty much everything you would expect from one of Rogers's movies.