Courage of Lassie (1946)

The Worst Film Ever

Please don't spend money on this.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

The joyful confection is coated in a sparkly gloss, bright enough to gleam from the darkest, most cynical corners.

If you enjoy watching "A-Dog-As-A-Shining-Hero" movie, then you're sure to get a satisfying charge out of Courage Of Lassie (COL, for short) from 1946.Featuring plenty of carefully staged wildlife photography (especially within its first 20 minutes), COL had our favourite celebrity canine, Lassie, heading out on one daring, brave and big-hearted adventure after another.As something of a bonus - COL starred a fresh-faced, 14-year-old Elizabeth Taylor, who played young Kathie Merrick, the easily-excitable daughter of simple sheep ranchers etching out a modest living in the American North-West.All-in-all - COL was, for the most part, an enjoyable enough feature film, but I seriously think that its story was probably best suited for a much younger audience than myself.*Note* - What didn't make a whole lot of sense to me was that, even though this film's title clearly named this prized collie-dog as Lassie, Kathie kept repeatedly calling this pedigree pooch, Bill, for whatever reason.

Seeing this in 2013 for the first time and as a 50-year-old adult, I really tried to imagine what I would have thought of this film had I been a young teen back in the late 1940s. I think I might have had a different reaction, but I have to say I didn't care for it at all and thought it was pretty odd.I won't recap the plot -- you can read other people's comments for that -- I'll just skip to what bugged me the most. Aside from the multiple "Oh, c'mon!" moments that made no sense at all, I thought the acting was very over the top by everyone -- with the possible exception of the dog. Several characters did highly moronic things, which, although they moved the story along, were very unbelievable, irresponsible, and disturbing.I'll give the film two stars for the outdoor sequences which had some gorgeous scenery, although I was wondering for about the first 15 minutes if I hadn't recorded a National Geographic nature flick by mistake.

The third movie in the Lassie series, this one confusingly stars a male dog named Pal playing a female dog named Lassie playing a male dog named Bill, who is then, in the course of the film re-named Duke. Got that? I guess it's not that important. Bill (terrible name for a dog) is born on an island. His mother's master rescues the mother and the rest of the litter, but doesn't see Bill, who then grows up in the wild. The wild, which is populated by a trained bear and some other animals. After growing up to adulthood, Bill is surprisingly non-feral and is discovered by a 14 year-old Elizabeth Taylor. Right after Taylor finds him, Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer shoots him with bird shot. Taylor cares for him until he's well again, with the help of Frank Morgan. Then Bill is hit by an Army truck (the poor damn dog can't get a break). After he regains his strength again, the Army guys take him to Japan (or maybe Europe), where they use him as, I don't know, a decoy to draw enemy fire. He finally gets back to America and finds his way back to Elizabeth Taylor, but not before he kills some farm chickens. He's put on trial (!) and gets the death penalty. Frank Morgan saves him after discovering he was an Army dog and understanding he has post-traumatic stress syndrome. Anyway, this is obviously mind-numbingly stupid, and it provides a few good laughs that way in its run. It's filmed in a pretty Technicolor. But it's not worth seeing, obviously. As, I suppose, I watched this in honor of Taylor, I should say a brief word about her. She's a sweet kid, and, like in National Velvet, a pretty good actress already. The film is so silly, though, and she's not really in it that much that she can hardly save it.

This is a mildly entertaining Lassie film in which the collie (who is named Bill in the story) plays the leading role while the human players (ELIZABETH TAYLOR, FRANK MORGAN, TOM DRAKE) are mere foils. The plot concerns a pretty teen-aged Taylor who finds him in the Canadian wilderness, loses him when he goes astray, and finds him again in time for a heart-warming conclusion, but only after war-weary dog has gone on trial for, of all things, murder.It starts out slowly as a nature film with nothing but shots of rabbits and other woodland creatures before it gets to the heart of the story with the opening scenes of Frank Morgan and Elizabeth Taylor (in her early teens and seemingly unspoiled, giving one of her more natural performances). Taylor's fawning over Lassie seems genuine, if a bit too sentimental, and it's a relief at the finale that she is reunited with her pet.Standout are the war scenes where Lassie is forced to help American soldiers in a dangerous assault on some Japanese soldiers. Lassie is trained in these chores by soldier TOM DRAKE and after battle fatigue sets in he becomes another shell-shocked victim of war. How he's able to return to Taylor for the film's happy ending is the balance of the story.Nicely done, filmed in wilderness areas of Canada and the state of Washington, but still just a minor entry in the Lassie stories.