Customer Reviews

Thunderhead - Son of Flicka

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I willnever tire of this Classic story about a young boy coming of age during the time when real men road the ranges and spoke to a woman with kind loving words. This moives holds much history both in cimema and in Good Old American family values.
This story shows how a young boy learns responibility of becoming a man by learning how to raise his own wild stallion. A sotry of trust and courage to prove not just his own abilities in himself but to prove to his father that he can make responible decisions and same the family ranch from a wild Albino stallion who is stealing the vital investmate keeping the ranch going - the mares!

"Thunderhead - Son of Flicka" (1945) is the enjoyable follow-up to the 1943 semi-classic "My Friend Flicka." Both films feature teen star Roddy McDowall as Ken McLaughlin, who is the son of horse ranchers. When Ken's horse, Flicka, gives birth to a colt, Ken decides to name him Goblin and predicts that he will be a great racehorse. His family is skeptical, and the horse proves to be like his mother, with a mind of his own. Ken struggles to even break Goblin, let alone get him to race, but eventually the young horse blossoms into a magnificent white stallion who they rename Thunderhead. Things take a turn for the horse when a wild albino stallion begins to cause problems in the nearby canyons. Eventually these two plotlines converge, and all turns out well.

Based on the children's book by Mary O'Hara, "Thunderhead" has a pretty basic and predictable plot. However, the beautiful scenery and warm family feeling of the film help raise this above the typical throw-away 40s western. The film was shot in beautiful Technicolor and looks quite handsome. Roddy McDowall was, of course, British and he seems to make no effort to hide his accent; so Ken speaks like a prim English school boy even though the film takes place in Wyoming, and his screen parents (Preston Foster & Rita Johnson) are American actors with no discernible accents. The effect is somewhat jarring. The film also features a surprisingly gruesome ending, although most of the action takes place off camera. All in all, "Thunderhead" is a decent flick that will probably appeal most to young children and horse lovers (well except for that gruesome finale!). A 1948 film, "Green Grass of Wyoming," continues the story, although without McDowall or the other original actors.

It was my favorite childhood movie and I just had to get it on DVD so I can have it forever.

This is a fun old classic horse movie. My daughter has to own every horse movie there is. We love Roddy McDowall.

I never did receive the DVD. I've been ordering products from Amazon for over 6 years and this is the first time I've not received what I ordered.

I had searched for 'Thunderhead' for a long time and had almost given up when i found it with your great selection. Thank you for making owning this movie easy and with satisfaction

Thunderhead, Son of Flicka, as well as Flicka were my first grandsons all time favorite movies when he was around 3 or 4 years old. We watched them everyday and sometimes more than once a day. He loved the horses. My youngest son was into roping and he gave my grandson a short strand of light rope for him to use. He sat on the arm of our recliner and yelled, 'Ride 'um cowboy' and threw his lasso at an imaginary steer. The 'horse' sometimes bucked him off. Those days are gone as he will be 25 in July, but the memories are still vivid. So glad to have found this on dvd as my tapes are worn out.

Thunderhead - Son of Flicka This is an excellent movie for children. My granddaughter age seven, and my grandson age three both enjoyed it, as I did when I was young.

...than the original "My Friend Flicka". As mentioned in an excellent review, Roddy's English accent is a distraction, and he played his role in Flicka as a rather wimpy kid. This second offering makes an obvious attempt to "man him up" and is successful on some accounts. Particularly in the scenes portraying his efforts to "break" Goblin. I much preferred the interaction between father and son in this second film as well.
Now something else to enjoy in this film is the editing. It was a difficult film to edit especially with some rather violent clashes amongst the animals. By the standards of the day this was a very realistic film. The color quality was excellent even by today's films.
This is better than "My Friend Flicka" but not as good as the remake "Flicka". It is family fare, but take note, there is some pretty heavy animal vs. animal violence, but mostly implied off camera