Hawk of the Hills on AllMovie

One of the most fondly remembered serials of the late silent era, The Hawk of the Hills became a showcase for Frank Lackteen, the Lebanese character actor who played the title role. When an old prospector (Robert Chandler) hits the mother lode, the vicious half-breed leader of a gang of renegades (Lackteen) concocts a plan to kidnap his pretty blond daughter, Mary (Allene Ray). Kidnapping actually proves one of the lesser of the perils faced by poor Mary in this blood-and-thunder serial filmed at Newhall, CA, by genre specialist Spencer G. Bennet. Happily, stalwart Walter Miller, playing a government agent, was always there to extricate the damsel-in-distress. Customers for this serial were handed a "Movieland Puzzle" courtesy of the Milton Bradley Company of Springfield, MA, just one of the gimmicks used to entice prospective audiences to attend the opening chapter. The Hawk of the Hills did the rest, and most audiences returned for the ensuing nine chapters. A five-reel feature version of this serial was released in 1929.