Daniel Boone

1936 "ONE OF THE MOST THRILLING STORIES OF AMERICAN HISTORY EVER FILMED!"
5.6| 1h15m| NR| en| More Info
Released: 16 October 1936 Released
Producted By: RKO Radio Pictures
Country: United States of America
Budget: 0
Revenue: 0
Official Website:
Synopsis

In 1775, Daniel Boone settles Kentucky, despite menacing Indians and renegade whites.

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RKO Radio Pictures

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Reviews

Rijndri Load of rubbish!!
InformationRap This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.
Erica Derrick By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.
Kaelan Mccaffrey Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.
bkoganbing Daniel Boone had a long and fascinating life and he's still the prototype for those classic American frontier characters. He set a standard which people in later generations like Davy Crockett, Kit Carson, and Buffalo Bill were measured by. His life would warrant a mini-series. Any resemblance to that life and the film Daniel Boone which was RKO films big budget item for 1936 is purely coincidental. They don't even get the name of his wife in the character Heather Angel plays right.I will say that George O'Brien does make an impressive looking Daniel Boone and it's definitely in the tradition of a hero for the kiddie trade. This colonial era film plays like a western, but even the great Cecil B. DeMille made some of the same mistakes with his big budget epic Unconquered that starred Gary Cooper and Paulette Goddard and was set in the same era.Another and more infamous colonial frontier character makes an appearance in Daniel Boone. John Carradine plays a lean and mean Simon Girty and his performance here might have led John Ford to cast him in a similar role in Drums Along The Mohawk.Girty may have been one of the first diagnosed cases of Stockholm syndrome. As a kid he was captured by the Indians and adapted so well to their lifestyle that he sympathized with them and their cause the rest of his life. He sided with the Tories during the American Revolution so he's come down to us as a renegade and traitor.But as far as I know he and Daniel Boone never even met, let alone become antagonists. Simon Girty lived almost as long as Daniel Boone. Girty died in 1818 at his farm in Ontario, Canada where he's not exactly a hero, but doesn't have the bad reputation he has on this side of the Great Lakes. Boone of course died in 1820 and the action here takes place in the 1770s.The film might have been better had one of the bigger studios done it. Daniel Boone was a project for MGM or Warner Brothers not RKO Pictures.
Michael_Elliott Daniel Boone (1936) ** (out of 4) RKO film about Daniel Boone (George O'Brien) leading settlers from North Carolina to Kentucky while fighting a crazed white man (John Carradine) who's in good with deadly Indians. This adventure story is okay but it's certainly hampered by its low budget, which makes for a pretty dry story. When the action does kick in its way too late to save the film. O'Brien is good but Carradine steals the show even though he's chewing his way through each scene.This movie is available through countless public domain labels.
ma-cortes The picture deals as the title says about Daniel Boone ( George O'Brien ) , as famous scout , he leads some settler families towards Kentucky state ; meanwhile he falls in love with a beautiful colonist ( Heather Angel ) facing off her suitor ( Ralph Forbes ) . Besides , he'll confront Indians led by a nasty villain ( John Carradine ) , risks and numerous perils. The film is based on real events , these are the following : In 1775,after mediating the purchase of 20 million acres of Kentucky Cherokee land,which was about to be opened to white settlers as the 14th colony,Transylvania,the 40 years old Boone(1734-1820,dead at the age of 85) led colonials to blaze trail.Driving northward from Tenessee through the Cumberland Gap to the Kentucky River,they cleared the famous Wilderness Road,which ended at a settlement on the Kentucky, they called Boonesborough in honor to his name.Daniel Boone as militia leader charged with directing the defense of Kentucky's frontier settlements against Indian attacks and stalled a raid on defenseless women and children left in Boonesboro.Captured by Shawnees and after escaping,Boone reached the settlement in time to help fight off Indian attack and his legend grew to epic proportions and would gain an inflated reputation as Indian fighter ,learning his wilderness skills from friendly Native Americans whose ways he respected and understood.In fact,the myths about Boone's prowess abounded and multiplied even in his own time,but in true,Boone never relished fighting Native Americans and may have killed only one Indian during his entire career and contrary to myth he never wore a coonskin cap.His greatest legacy is,perhaps,his undying legend as the first trail-brazer of America's advance to the West coastThe motion picture packs adventures , battles , action though is a little bit outdated because of being an early talkie the film-copy is worn-out. The flick will appeal to old movies buffs and frontier western enthusiasts.
dinky-4 A well-crafted script efficiently sets up three areas of conflict: white settlers in 1775 Kentucky vs. local Indians stirred up by a renegade named Simon Girty; these same white settlers vs. corrupt officials back in Richmond; and he-man Daniel Boone vs. fancy-man Stephen Marlowe for the affections of the beautiful Virginia Randolph. These conflicts are woven together into a briskly-paced frontier drama which, while showing its age, still holds one's interest. Its chief fault is an ending which, at least on the tape available, seems unfocused and a bit confusing.Though not well remembered today, leading man George O'Brien was a popular actor in late silents and early talkies. During a fight scene in 1924's "The Iron Horse" his shirt was torn off and audiences got an uncommon eyeful of "beefcake" which earned for O'Brien a nickname: the Chest. Though only 35 or 36 years old when he filmed "Daniel Boone," O'Brien shows signs of middle-age in the form of a somewhat expanded waistline but he's still featured in an extended "beefcake" scene. Captured by Indians he's tied, shirtless, to a post and soon surrounded by burning piles of wood. His bindings allow him to move in a tight circle around the post, (an authentic touch), so O'Brien sweats and squirms as he tries to avoid the tongues of flame. It's a good scene but cut far too short by an all-too-easy rescue. (A shirtless O'Brien also suffered through a prison flogging in 1928's "Honor Bound" but prints of this movie seem to be unavailable.)John Carradine makes a hissable villain and Heather Angel is an appropriately pretty heroine but Ralph Forbes seems a bit "too, too" as the no-good Stephen Marlowe. No woman would regard him as a serious competitor for George O'Brien! Black actor Clarence Muse has a role surprisingly free of most of the era's usual stereotypes.