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Was a horse killed in the making of this film?

posted 13 years ago by TopFlight
5 replies | jump to latest

This is directed to those who have a recording of the film as presented recently by Turner Classic Movies. I think there's a possibility the horse who played "Snowfire" was killed in the making of this film. Please review your recording of the fall from the cliff in the first five minutes of the movie. Note how the film is edited. First, there's a close shot of a real horse clambering over some rocks. He jumps out of the picture on the left. Then it cuts to a long shot of what appears to be a real horse, legs moving, falling down the cliff. There's a sudden cut to an obviously fake horse dummy seen from above falling into the water. Then a huge splash where you can't really see what fell. Then an edit to the ranch owner and ranch hands observing, then another cut to the horse swimming. I think the reason for the quick cut from the real horse in the long shot is that he started tumbling, striking the cliff wall, and died in the fall. Think about it - if this shot had turned out well, why would they have cut it short? I notice there's no indication that any animal welfare group participated in the filming of this movie. Also, I notice that this very talented horse appears to have no other film credits on his record. That would make sense if he died making this film. (There's also the possibility the horse that went over the cliff was an "expendable" white horse (not the trained "King the Horse Cotton") destined for the slaughterhouse, not that that makes killing a horse for the sake of a movie scene acceptable.)

What do you think?

[–] Jaynrand 13 years ago

I have seen the film, and the cuts are pretty obviously there because the horse was not on a high cliff and was in no danger. The cuts disguise the fact that the horse was not in danger.

Just clever movie making magic not any animal endangerment.

[–] p_gruendler 12 years ago

The long shot was also a dummy. Watch your recording in s.l.o.w. motion and see.

[–] jobla 11 years ago

On a somewhat related note, I saw SOLOMON AND SHEBA and TARAS BULBA when I was very young. Both films end with "horses" falling off a cliff. As an adult, I can see that the "horses" falling off the cliff were merry-go-round wooden horses. I'm sure that SNOWFIRE was filmed in the same manner, with a dummy or merry-go-round horse used in the long shot.

[–] King_Of_Fuh 11 years ago

The McGowan's would likely never have put an animal in danger. They also filmed the original film version of "The Littlest Hobo" the same year, and were involved with the original TV series about five years later. They were animal lovers.

[–] TopFlight 10 years ago

I watched that segment over and over in very slow motion and freeze-framing it on a 46" 1080p TV. That's the reason I'm still convinced that that shot did not turn out well. In the '50s in this extremely remote location, I'd bet it would have been fairly easy to get away with killing an "expendable" (i.e., not the trained horse but a look-alike) horse for the sake of a film. I guess we'll never know - probably everybody involved in making this film is dead, and they probably wouldn't admit any wrongdoing anyway. I'm not saying that they wanted a horse to die, but they set up a stunt where that was a fairly predictable result if it didn't go perfectly.