Lumsdal Good , But It Is Overrated By Some

Chirphymium It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

Aneesa Wardle The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Jenni Devyn Worth seeing just to witness how winsome it is.

bindagr If you combined The Quiet Man with Sergeant York, you'd mostly have The Shepherd of the Hills. But in this case the end result is far weaker than constituent parts. The setting, characters, grudges, romance and violence is all very similar to that in the first half of Sergeant York. There are two aspects of this movie that should be recognizable to any fan of The Quiet Man. The first being the name of the piece land that the wealthy stranger buys to the chagrin of fearsome locals. In The Quiet Man, it's "White O'Morn". In this movie it's "Mourning Meadow". The other is the way John Wayne says "Thanks" for unhelpful input form well meaning outsiders when he's in a big fight. Incidentally, Ward Bond who plays a supporting role in The Shepherd of the Hills was in both The Quiet Man and Sergeant York.Clearly a lot of money was spent to make this movie. Technicolor in 1941 was itself a budget buster. The cast is amazing. I don't think there's another movie that includes Margorie Mane and Beulah Bondi. There are some very wonderful moments where it all comes together. But overall, it's a disappointment. The story is choppy and the ending is just hokey.

smatysia Not really what you'd consider a "John Wayne movie" inasmuch as his character is important, but not dominant. This film is set in, I suppose, the Ozarks, in a not completely specified time. There is mention of telephones in the cities, but no sighting or mention of automobiles and no electricity out there in the boonies. I suppose it could be anywhere from 1885 to 1910. Wayne plays a character other than "himself" which he is often accused of doing nothing but. Bettie Field plays a love interest for him. Her character is never seen wearing shoes. Harry Carey steals the show, as the stranger from the city. Every one used what they thought were hillbilly accents and verbiage, but notably without seeming very condescending about it. Overall, it is an OK film, no more.

mark.waltz This complex drama about bitterness and feuds in the Ozarks is a very dark saga that takes much patience to endure. Extremely well acted and beautifully photographed, this is deeply depressing in spots and at tines angering. Beaulah Bondi, a far cry from her tired but kindly matron in the similar "The Trail of the Lonesome Pine", is the angry and vindictive head of a clan who blames her mistakes of the past on the others around her, even if they were not even born when they took place. John Wayne is her nephew, key to the past being revealed, while Harry Carey is a newcomer to the mountain who might hold the key to unlocking the secrets buried for years.And then there is Marjorie Main, aged greatly as Bondi's cousin, a blind woman who can figure out the truth and see into the eyes of true character without really seeing them. James Barton as Bondi's husband and Betty Field as a feisty local girl also add to the drama which at times is gripping tragedy and on occasion a frustrating soap opera.This all culminates in a sequence where Main miraculously gains her sight back and visits her kin-folk whom she has not seen in years. One look at Bondi tells her everything she needs to know about a once lovely young woman whose soul has pretty much died, while a glance at both Wayne and Carey bring out other truths.In spite of its frustrating moments, it is gripping in an almost Shakrspearean way and concludes with a double tragedy. If it wasn't for the professional company and outstanding technical team, this could have been a dud.

bkoganbing Herbert J. Yates of Republic Pictures must have gotten a tidy sum from Paramount for the use of his number one star for his first technicolor feature film. Shepherd of the Hills was the first film in which John Wayne worked with director Henry Hathaway. They didn't work together again for another 19 years and then in the Sixties did four films culminating with Wayne's Oscar winning performance in True Grit.In fact Hathaway had directed the first outdoor technicolor film in the same Ozark area for Paramount five years earlier in The Trail of the Lonesome Pine. You think of this area of the country and you either think of the comic characters of The Beverly Hillbillies or the inbred freaks of Deliverance. In both films Hathaway avoids those stereotypes and he creates characters of dignity and strength. John Wayne is Matt Matthews whose father left his mother before she was born and she died leaving him to be raised by his aunt Beulah Bondi. Bondi's a bitter old woman who fills the Duke's head with evil thoughts about his father. A stranger comes to their valley and has a lot of money, buys a piece of property from the Matthews clan and settles there. Harry Carey wins over most of the people there with several acts of kindness and charity. He especially makes a big fan of Betty Field who's a hankerin' after the Duke.Carey's got a past secret and I think if you read the review you can figure out what it is without me being explicit. But all is revealed in the end and it's worth the wait. Wayne and Carey have a great chemistry between them because next to John Ford, Harry Carey was probably the single biggest influence in creating a star named John Wayne from a USC football player named Marion Michael Morrison who earned some extra money working as a prop man on silent movie sets. The same rapport between them is also carried over to The Angel and the Badman which Wayne produced himself.Shepherd of the Hills is a good film about some simple people with some great performances by the entire cast.