“Ford's first film for Fox was Just Pals, a Buck Jones (the great silent Western star) vehicle released in late 1920, combining folksy Will Rogers Americana with a certain amount of Western-type action. It is a good film, one of its major surprises being the charm of Buck Jones' performance in a character that doesn't always ring true with its juxtaposition of sentiment, he-man heroics, and rather illogically extreme tendencies towards self-sacrifice.” -W.K. Everson, “Forgotten Ford,” in Focus On Film, Spring 1971.

It is the story of a town loafer (“just watching people working makes Bim tired”), and how his friendship with a thirteen-year-old-boy (who jumped off a train going through town) changes him. Ford himself has said that this was the first film to indicate that Buck Jones could act.