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Australia · 1982
Rated PG · 1h 44m
Director George T. Miller
Starring Tom Burlinson, Terence Donovan, Kirk Douglas, Tommy Dysart
Genre Adventure, Drama, Family, Romance, Western
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Jim Craig has lived the first 18 years of his life in the mountains of Australia on his father's farm. However, the death of his father forces him to go to the low lands to earn enough money to get the farm back on its feet.
Miller dolls up a routine passage-to-manhood saga with widescreen mountain locations and a camera that only moves to show off the expensive production values. The presence of Kirk Douglas in two roles (his scallywag performance and his gritted one) attempts to give the film the gloss of an American Western, fooling no one.
We hear a lot about the great hunger for "wholesome" films, but it is rare that one is successful; wholesomeness and treacle seem to have become confused in the Hollywood mind. The Man From Snowy River is different. It's a lesson in how such films should be made. [26 Jan 1983, p.B8]
Christian Science Monitor by David Sterritt
It's kind of fun, and Australians apparently love it, buying enough tickets to make it their country's all-time champ at the box office. But anybody much older than Star Wars - the movie that definitively replaced horses and six-shooters with rockets and ray guns - has seen it all a million times before. [03 Feb 1983, p.18]
Washington Post by Gary Arnold
A rousing and scenically breathtaking romance about ranch life in the 1880s, the film should recommend itself strongly to families. [24 Dec 1982, p.14]
The Guardian by Luke Buckmaster
More than just an Aussie horse opera, this film employs stunning scenery, technical flair and Kirk Douglas in two roles in its pursuit of an uplifting conclusion.
Chicago Sun-Times by Roger Ebert
It's corny in places, and kind of dumb, and its subplot about the romance between the boy and the girl seems plundered from some long-shelved Roddy McDowell script. But The Man from Snowy River has good qualities, too, including some great aerial photography of thundering herds of horses, and the invigorating grandeur of the Australian landscape.
The New York Times by Vincent Canby
To appreciate it fully, however, one must have a completely uncritical fondness for Kirk Douglas as he acts his heart out in two roles; for picturesque landscapes; for silly plots, and for dialogue that leans heavily on aphorisms too homespun to be repeated in a big-city newspaper.
Fire is survival.