Green Grass of Wyoming (1948)

Sadly Over-hyped

A story that's too fascinating to pass by...

It's a movie as timely as it is provocative and amazingly, for much of its running time, it is weirdly funny.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

Songs (all rendered by Burl Ives): "Way Down Yonder in the Paw-Paw Patch"; "I Wish I Were Single Again"; "A Little Stranger". Sound recording: Bernard Freericks and Harry M. Leonard. Western Electric Sound System. Producer: Robert Bassler.Copyright 16 May 1948 by 20th Century-Fox Film Corp. New York opening at the Roxy: 9 June 1948. U.S. release: 20 April 1948. U.K. release: 21 February 1949. Australian release: 26 August 1948. Lengths: 8,166 feet, 90½ minutes (Australia); 89 minutes (U.S.A.); 85 minutes (U.K.).SYNOPSIS: Two Wyoming ranchers vie for honors at a trotting-race.NOTES: Clarke was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Color Cinematography (won by Joan of Arc). Green Grass of Wyoming is a sequel to Thunderhead, Son of Flicka (which itself is a sequel to My Friend Flicka).COMMENT: Third and final film in the Flicka series. Oddly enough, most of the main technicians from Thunderhead re-unite for this effort but this time the players are completely different. Even the Swedish man-of-all-work has been changed to an American Gus that will accommodate Burl Ives who is virtually repeating his characterization from Will James' Smoky (on which Bassler, King, Clarke and De Maggio also worked).There is a reason for the complete change of cast in that the McLaughlins are no longer the center of attention but are forced to share the limelight with two new characters played by Charles Coburn and Peggy Cummins. Just as well, for Master Arthur is no substitute for Roddy McDowall and even Lloyd Nolan fits indifferently into Preston Foster's shoes. Mr Ives, however, is a vastly more entertaining Gus - even if he has little to do in the action (his part in the climax is limited to a single camera set-up spliced into the proceedings at regular intervals). He does have two or three songs (wish there were more!) which he puts across with his usual delightful artistry.Charles Coburn plays what is virtually the lead role with ingratiating sympathy, but Peggy Cummins seems slightly ill-at-ease and miscast. She does her best, but her accent is all wrong too (even if the script does give her an Irish mother). Lloyd Nolan manages little more than to rattle off his lines but Will Wright is surprisingly effective in a much larger role than he is normally assigned. He does his own riding too - as does Coburn (except of course in the long shots of the race where it is skillfully doubled).Mr King's direction is a couple of notches above his usual pedestrian level, the locations are nothing short of breathtaking, and the film packs in more incident than Flicka and Thunderhead combined. The climactic race with its ingeniously suspenseful three heats is especially exciting (even if it does fall short of the thrilling conclusion of Home in Indiana}.Technical credits are Fox smooth. Mockridge has now mastered Alfred Newman's Flicka themes and although they are not as robustly delivered, they are more pleasantly and deftly handled than in Thunderhead. Which brings us to the one feature not mentioned till now: the horses. Animal and horse-lovers will find plenty to rejoice about. The picture even ends with an albino foal promising yet another sequel - although this did not eventuate. (Aside from the Flicka trilogy, the only other novel I have for Mrs Sture-Vasa is "The Catch Colt", published in 1978.)

Sorry to say they just don't make 'em like this any more. Fine horse story back when animal pictures were popular in the late 40's. Beautifully photographed in Technicolor, the movie's a real eye-catcher, along with a fine screenplay and cast. I simply can't believe that it's the same Peggy Cummins (Carey) that the following year would terrorize the screen as the psycho-sexual Annie Laurie Starr in the noir classic Gun Crazy(1949). Here she's the perfect rural ingénue, sweet, innocent, and supportive, while she and Arthur (Ken) make an engaging young couple. Still, the contrast with Gun Crazy remains an incredible transition.Speaking of grabbers, the magnificent horseflesh of Thunderhead and Crown Jewel should get animal Oscars for their fine performances. Okay, at least their trainers should. Then too, when the two are together, the color contrast between white-white and black-black is a real grabber. The story blends in nicely as the two families try to settle their differences through a mutual admiration for race horses (trotters or pacers, I'm not sure which). For an over-weight old guy, Coburn does well in a physically active part, while the ending seems particularly appropriate. Add the tuneful interludes of Burl Ives, and you've got perfect family fare, even for the urbanized 21st century.

For this third and final film in the saga of the McLaughlin family out west all the roles were recast from My Friend Flicka and Thunderhead, Son of Flicka. The McLaughlin family is now parents Lloyd Nolan and Geraldine Wall with son Robert Arthur and young Arthur is starting to notice girls. The girl he's noticing is Peggy Cummins a new neighbor who lives with garrulous Grandpa Charles Coburn who has a bit of a drinking problem. Coburn was once a big name in the harness racing sport, but has fallen on bad times.The main problem that all of them are dealing with is white stallion Thunderhead who is giving out a mating call that all the mares from miles around are heeding. That includes a mare that Arthur has been raising for the harness racing circuit.The usual plot situations involving kids and horses are present in Green Grass Of Wyoming. And we get a few musical numbers that fit in nicely with the country atmosphere of the film, courtesy of Burl Ives who plays the McLaughlin ranch hand.Green Grass Of Wyoming is a nice family film that still holds up well for family viewing in this century.

Peggy Cummins, adopting an amusing Irish burr, plays one of those dungaree dolls who are crazy about horses and the neighboring teenage boy, wearing her blonde hair in tight pigtails and taking a stern hand with her hard-drinking, rough-hewn grandpa as if she were in-training to be his wife. The script for this family film, based on Mary O'Hara's book--and sort of a second-cousin to her popular sagas "My Friend Flicka" and "Thunderhead, Son of Flicka"--is perfunctory without being exciting, and the movie is so well-scrubbed it's beatific. Narrator Burl Ives also appears, playing a guitar-strumming ranch-hand (he entertains at the teen-dance singing the totally inappropriate novelty, "I Wish I Were Single Again") and Charles Coburn is Cummins' grandfather, who blames a mythic wild horse from running off with his mares. Charles G. Clarke's picture-postcard photography was Oscar-nominated, and deservedly so: his rich Technicolor panoramas display beautiful blue skies and vast mountain terrain, handsome ranch houses nestled in the hills and even horses who seem satisfied. The climax at the sulky races isn't a crowd-pleaser, but the film may placate animal-lovers even though it's all been done before. **1/2 from ****