| | | Directed by George Stevens.
Features: DVD, Pan and Scan (TV Format), Aspect Ratio 1.33:1, English, French, Subtitled
A lively biography about the female sharpshooter and her on-again off-again romance with Wild Bill Hickok.
"...a fine feminist story of a woman with her own career and marriage too." Sanderson Beck, Movie Mirrors
Editor's Note
George Stevens' semi-fictional biography of the famed sharpshooter stars Barbara Stanwyck in the title role. After arriving in Cincinnati from rural Ohio in the late 19th Century, she gets into a shooting contest with Toby Walker (Preston Foster), the ace sharpshooter of the New York vaudeville circuit. Both Toby and the crowd are awed by her marksmanship, but Annie decides to deliberately throw the match, afraid of alienating her opponent, to whom she finds herself strongly attracted. Jeff Hogarth (Melvyn Douglas), one of the partners in Buffalo Bill Cody's Wild West Show, impressed with Annie's shooting and taken with her charms, offers her a job. When Toby becomes aware of Cody's dissatisfaction with Annie's showmanship, the sharpshooter begins to teach her some new tricks, and she soon becomes a star in her own right. Press agent Ned Buntline (Dick Elliot) decides to cook up a "feud" between the two sharpshooters to enhance the show's drawing power, but, like the film, it has little to do with the truth. An enjoyable, elaborately produced, and well-made biopic with a terrific Stanwyck, ANNIE OAKLEY is a winner. The unfortunate treatment of Chief Sitting Bull as a Native American counterpart of Stepin' Fetchit may be attributed to the attitudes of the period.
| Features | Audio: English Dolby Digital Mono | | Interactive Menus | | Scene Selection | | Subtitles: English, French |
| Technical Info
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Release Information
| | Studio: Turner Home Entertainment |
| Release Date: 10/23/2007 |
| Running Time: 90 minutes |
| Catalog ID: 7891 | | UPC: 00053939789126 | | Number of Discs: 1 |
Audio & Video
| | Original Language: English | | Available Audio Tracks: English | | Video: B&W |
Aspect Ratio | | Standard 1.33:1 [4:3] |
| Cast & Crew | Barbara Stanwyck | | Melvyn Douglas | | Moroni Olsen | | Preston Foster | | Alberto Colombo - Original Music By | | Cliff Reid - Producer | | Ewart Adamson - Based On Story By | | George Stevens - Director | | Harold Wenstrom - Cinematographer | | J. Roy Hunt - Cinematographer | | Jack Hively - Editor | | Joel Sayre - Screenplay | | John Twist - Screenplay | | Joseph Fields - Based On Story By | | Van Nest Polglase - Art Director |
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| | Professional Reviews | Classic Film Guide 8 of 10
Directed by George Stevens, with a story by Joseph Fields & Ewart Adamson that was adapted by Joel Sayre & John Twist, this biographical Western drama about the famous sharpshooting woman features Barbara Stanwyck in the title role...The story is fictionalized: detailing the discovery of the backwoods teenage girl who could shoot flying pigeons in the head so as to not ruin them for consumption, her competition with sure shot world champion Frank Butler, dubbed Walker in the film, at MacIvor's (really Jack Frost's) hotel (ladies weren't supposed to be able to do the things that men could, back then; they weren't even allowed to enter a saloon), her signing with Buffalo Bill's traveling show, meeting Indian Chief Sitting Bull (who dubbed her "Watanya cicilia" or "Little Sure Shot"), and the chow's European tour. Though this film doesn't have Annie and Toby marry (as she did Frank in real life, and in the musical Annie Get Your Gun (1950) with Betty Hutton and Howard Keel), it does end on a particularly happy note.
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