User reviews

You know, it's the sort of film that's near impossible to write about because it's the simplicity of it all that makes it worth watching. The kind of film that I could never watch again yet after taking it in I had a smile on my face and a little lump in my throat. The film sees Fred MacMurray as a sort of drifting cowhand type who gets given a job by pocket dynamo rancher gal Anne Baxter. This brings him into contact with a wild horse known as Smoky and a true friendship between man and beast blossoms. Enter nasty man who steals horse away.......

There's few surprises along the way and the dialogue is often stilted, but it hits the spot of most who come into contact with it. It's directed by Louis King and the support cast features Bruce Cabot and a warbling merrily Burl Ives. Location work is out of Utah, while the film's interesting trivia sees it as the first known film work of Western character actor Slim Pickens. Safe family friendly Oater that is as warm as Grandma's freshly cooked apple pie. 7/10

Like "Lassie come home", if there is a movie i'll always remember, it is indeed the lovable "Smoky" and his loyal master McMurray.Fifty years ago, alone in a theater watching the film, having a hard time to see the screen because the tears in my eyes blurred the only scene i could never forget. I think it's near the end, when the true love of McMurray for his animal and Smoky's attachment for his real friend, burst you out of emotions. Glad i was alone, no one could laugh at me. The day after, when i narrated to my young friend, between the double features I have seen: "Going my way" with Bing Crosby as a priest, and "Smoky", i preferred and enjoyed by 200 yards, the latter, he did not understand why... Since many years, i searched as hard as Fred for his horse, without any luck to find the DVD or VHS. May be he did not pass my way yet! Or i have not cross their path. But one thing i am sure: no other horse did or never will surpass him on any screen.

It's a funny, romantic, suspenseful, tearjerker all rolled up into one movie. I have been looking for a copy of this movie for a very long time. the one time that I found copies of it I did not have a credit card, so unfortunately i missed out. I would love to have this movie for my kids to watch.

Smoky is the simple tale of a man and a horse. If Fred MacMurray were a juvenile we might say that Smoky would be a prototype for the Fury TV series.

MacMurray who said that he never felt comfortable in westerns may have given the performance of all time if that was the case. He's a lone cowhand who happens to see some cowboys from Anne Baxter's ranch trying to catch one strong and tricky wild black stallion. He brings him in and earns a job at her spread although foreman Roy Roberts doesn't like hiring a man who won't talk about his past.

The past in the form of Bruce Cabot catches up with Fred and he gets a job at the Baxter spread. But Fred's more interested in training Smoky who he does not want Baxter to sell, but he thinks can be a good cow pony.

He's everything that MacMurray could want, but like Fury he's fiercely loyal to one man only. If people were that way there would be no divorces.

Smoky marked the screen debut of Burl Ives as one of the hands who sang several of the folk ballads associated with him. In the wilds before mass media, a guy like Ives was probably a necessity in the way of entertainment for people working in an isolated area where the Baxter ranch seems to be.

It's quite a triangle, Anne, Fred, and the horse. In the end look to what happens to the wild horses in The Misfits for a clue as to what Smoky's fate at the end of the film.

The film is a nice one, well photographed with characters you like and root for. Especially the horse.

I can still remember walking home in silence beside my mother after having seen Smokey at our local Loew's theater in Yonkers, New York. I was so moved by this film, that I have never forgotten it. That was over 50 years ago and I only wish that a VHS or DVD copy was available so that I would be able to share this movie with my children and grandchildren. I enjoyed Smokey far better than National Velvet or Black Beauty. Fred MacMurray is excellent as the lead who has to deal with the emotional upheaval of losing his beloved horse. What happens to this fine animal will cause you to get a few lumps in your throat before the finale. A keeper if we could manage to find a copy!

I like Fred MacMurray films....so it's not too surprising that I'd watch "Smoky". The film is set in the present day and the story finds Clint (MacMurray) out west looking for a job at a ranch. However, it's obvious Clint is hiding something when they ask him about his previous jobs. Now, what we won't know is that he is hiding something....but he is an honest guy. Later, you learn about his past and why he isn't very forthcoming about his past.

Apart from all his other duties on his new job, Clint has a pet project....to train a very wild horse, Smoky, to be saddle-broken. But Clint doesn't want to break the horse...and he's very patient trying to get this horse to trust him. Eventually, it pays off when the horse ends up saving is life!

Now you'd think that at this point everything would be happily ever after, right? Nope. Find out what horrible things happen and how Clint ended up losing this beloved horse when you see the film.

This is essentially a horse film. If you love horsey films, then it definitely is for you. For everyone else, you may not be as impressed. One reason I wasn't thrilled with the film was the music. "On Top of Old Smoky" was sung or you heard the refrain on the screen just too many times....to the point where my wife and daughter started laughing every time they hear this! It would make for an excellent drinking game! And, apart from this, while I like the songs of Burl Ives, I think the film played a couple too many. Overall, a decent time passer...but not much more.

This is Fred MacMurray's BEST movie! It is awesome! It makes you laugh, cry, and rejoice at the end. The music is outstanding. The actors are great! The horse is beautiful. It is such a heartwarming story, one you will never forget once you have seen it. i don't understand why it is not available on vhs or dvd. There is another version with different actors available of this movie, i have it, but it's not near as good, doesn't rate compared to this movie version. PLEASE make it available to purchase! i'd buy it in a heartbeat! Thanks! GOD BLESS! : )

This is not a movie. At times it is a spoken novelette with elements of how to break in a work house. However, this is not entertaining, and the poorly written script does nothing to elevate the performances of Anne Baxter and the actors. Fred MacMurray is okay if he has a good script, but given a poorly written script he is less than mediocre. When Baxter is given a good script she can be feisty and spirited. Here, she is bland and horizon. When she stands up alongside MacMurray you realise how short she is. The film fails to provide good performances or a compelling story, and for this reason it is not a movie and Anne Baxter fans should stay away from it. It is nowhere near the quality of 'The Razor's Edge' or even 'Double Indemnity'.

Macmurray owns Smoky. He is separated from him (it's been so long since I've seen it, I'm not sure how). I think Macmurray has an accident, and by the time he wakes up, Smoky has been sold. Macmurray searches for him. The tale tells of both man and horse's adventures apart. At the end, Macmurray inadvertently comes across a man beating his horse, and Macmurray comes to the horse's rescue. It's raining, the horse is harnessed to a cart on the city street, Macmurray suddenly realizes it's Smoky. Even through the rain, you know Macmurray is crying tears of joy. It almost seems as if Smoky is too. I love this movie and would love to find a vhs copy to watch over and over. It must be at least 35 years since I've seen it. It was made in 1946, but I think it was released in 1951, my birth year. Julie

I have been looking for this film on DVD or VHS for at least 10 years. This is one of the best horse movies of all time. It is joyful and tearful, but a story of intense love for a horse. About a black stallion that Fred Mac Murray names "Smoky" because where there is fire there is Smoke. This story needs to be released in Digital DVD format. I have been a movie collector for over 45 years, this is one that everybody should see. A true family picture that displays a great tenderness, love, devotion, and courage that you will always remember. The stars Fred Mac Murray, Anne Baxter, and Burl Ives are at their best in their performances. Burl Ives a sings "Jimmy Crack Corn and I Don't Care" which fits the horse ranch fare.

Yes, the original Smokey is a classic, now almost a period piece. I'm almost 70 (February 1939), and believe I saw this movie on the week it was released. I think it was my first movie.

Yes, it's a beautiful, memorable, and sad story, especially when you're that young. I cried like I did with Bambi, but for this and a number of other reasons -- not the least of which are Fred McMurray's strong lead, Burl Ive's great renditions of what I believe are some of our most authentic American folk songs (e.g., "The Blue Tail Fly"), and Smokey a beautiful horse for a lasting concept of character that bonds independent loving humans to independent loving animals -- it compels me to ask who, having seen it, could ever forget it?

Does 20 Century Fox keep masters even when they're succeeded by remakes? If so, I'd sure like to get my hands on a copy of the original. Having Googled and Cuiled for this information without any success on and off over the past year and a half, I was beginning to wonder if there might not be other intentional reasons for this film's disappearance.

Conceivably, as it was produced in the '40s, the original Smokey may have contained language or stereotypes now recognized, rightly or wrongly, as politically incorrect. I may have been too young to recognize anything of this kind. More likely, Burl Ive's, like so many folk collectors, scholars and performers, was once blacklisted by Congress, the movie industry, and other witch hunting institutions because of alleged associations with "communists." Is the movie industry trying to protect us from our/their past? On the other hand, if the film's disappearance is, in fact, a casualty of such black listing or attempts at social engineering, it deprives us from seeing, and remembering, ourselves as we once were. In this case, the original Smokey needs to be re-released for its historical import at least. It is an American original.

I saw this movie as a pre-teen when it was first released and it has been one of my favorite films among the hundreds I have seen. Bring along the kleenex for this movie will bring tears to the eyes of everyone.

"Smoky" is quintessential family fare, with no surprises or plot twists; As a reader remarked, "man finds horse, man loses horse, man finds horse". Is it my imagination or are many horse stories similar? "War Horse" and "Black Beauty" had much the same theme as "Smoky".

In this one, Fred MacMurray arrives at a ranch under a cloud of suspicion. His cowboy credentials are impeccable, but some ranch hands have heard stories. All goes well until Bruce Cabot shows up and pleads with Our Hero to get him a job. But it turns out that Cabot is his ne'er-do-well brother, and Fred took the rap for him in another state. Fred has, meanwhile, found and broken a wild horse that is the envy of the local horsemen. Cabot finds the horse 'ornery' and despises it. Naturally, things happen, Fred and the horse are separated, and the horse ends up with - you guessed it, Cabot. From here you can fill in the blanks.

The movie, filmed in and around Utah's Zion National Park, is gorgeous to look at while the movie itself has a very pedestrian feel. No new ground is broken in the story and co-star Anne Baxter has very little to do despite being the manager of the ranch. Burl Ives gets to sing some songs in the bunkhouse. Kids will like this picture more than adults will, and it is a pleasant way to spend 90 minutes.

Louis King, a director about whose work and career I know very little, directs this unsentimental tale about a wild horse, Smoky, that refuses to be deprived of his freedom and character, and for a long time eludes the many cowboys trying to rope and domesticate him.

That is, until Fred MacMurray comes on the scene and decides that Smoky is his kind of horse and he wants it. Lovely ranch owner Anne Baxter also develops a torch for Fred and so all ducks are in a row for taming and giving a deservedly good life to beautiful wild Smoky... that is, until Bruce Cabot - reportedly the man who in real life ruined Errol Flynn and who, according to David Niven's accounts in his autobiographies THE MOON'S A BALLOON and BRING ON THE EMPTY HORSES, constantly borrowed and thieved his way through life, a real good for nothing - turns up. Up until then, MacMurray had remained cagily quiet, refusing to discuss his past. We learn that Cabot is MacMurray's brother and he thinks nothing of allowing MacMurray to do jail time when he was the actual culprit.

Cabot is not just a badass forger, thief, and general public enemy, he is also cruel and he wants to beat the hell out of poor Smoky... problem is - always a problem, ain't it? - the quadruped is cleverer than Cabot realizes.

In the end, after a long separation, MacMurray and Smoky reunite, and Baxter seems keen to share a life with Mac, too. A happy ending to a film that tries to be honest and reflects the hardship a wild horse has to go through when it is deprived of its freedom.

Charles Clarke's cinematography has its moments, but should have put the wonderful landscapes to better use; David Raksin's score is very fitting and the songs well delivered in the warm voice of Burl Ives (I had no idea that he was a crooner before turning into an Oscar-winning thespian); and the screenplay by Lillie Hayward and Dwight Cummins certainly grabs you, though I think Baxter deserved a meatier part.

All's well that ends well. If the system permitted it, I would have rated SMOKY 7.5 but, seeing that it does not, I am rounding it up to 8, which it deserves more than a plain 7/10.

I guess I'm officially in my second childhood since I found that I enjoyed watching this sweet, gentle Western about a cowboy and his horse that is more than a little Disneyfied (although I doubt if Uncle Walt would have allowed that shot of Anne Baxter's cleavage when she goes to take a swimsuit dip in the river).

I liked almost everything about it. Liked the Utah and Cheyenne Wyoming location cinematography that resembles a Sundance catalog, circa 1946. (Sure wish I owned that Woody station wagon!) Liked Fred Mac Murray's relaxed yet intense performance, perfect for a laconic cowboy with a past. Liked the fact that the ranch was very capably run by a woman on her own, certainly not common for a movie set in 1940s, sexist Hollywood, and was even more pleased that the romance between Baxter and MacMurray took a definite backseat to the relationship between MacMurray and the title character. In other words, I vehemently disagree with a previous reviewer who called Lilllie Hayward, Dwight Cummins and Dorothy Yost's screenplay "poorly written". And I absolutely LOVED the singing, if not the acting, of Burl Ives and could easily have listened to three or four additional songs. Give it a B.

PS...At this point in their respective acting careers Smoky surpasses Schwarzenegger.

I am not at all familiar with the Will James novel on which this movie is based as it seems to be unavailable in Great Britain and indeed despite decades of book buying and reading I do not recall ever having seen a copy

Clint Barklay,a man with a past, captures and tames the wild mustang Smoky by kindness rather than force only to lose him thanks to his ne'er do well brother Frank.Clint sets out to track down the animal and return him to the Richards ranch where he works Strong performance by McMurray who was always overshadowed by Fonda and Stewart in all genres and good backup from Cabot as his villainous brother and the stalwart Roy Rowlands as the ranch foreman who is suspicious of but ultimately accepting of Barklay.As an added bonus Burl Ives warbles some folk tunes in pleasant manner

It is nothing to get excited about but a decent professional job and that rarity today a genuine family movie

I was never able to get worked up about the movie but it is proficient and pleasant