Gallant Bess
| Gallant Bess | |
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Theatrical poster
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| Directed by | Andrew Marton |
| Produced by | Harry Rapf |
| Written by | Arthur Parker, under the pseudonym Marvin Parks (story origination) Jeanne Bartlett (story) |
| Starring |
Marshall Thompson George Tobias |
| Music by | Rudolph G. Kopp |
| Cinematography | John W. Boyle |
| Edited by | Harry Komer |
| Distributed by | Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer |
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Release date
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Running time
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100 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $1,218,000 |
| Box office | $2,011,000 |
Gallant Bess is a motion picture released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1946. It was loosely based on the true story of U.S. Navy Warrant Officer Arthur Parker's rescuing of an injured filly during World War II. Portions of the movie were filmed on the coast of Santa Barbara, California, in October 1945. This was the first MGM motion picture made in Cinecolor.
Art Parker grows up on a ranch in Montana in the early 1900s and has worked with horses. At the age of 17, he lies to enlist in the U.S. Navy. During World War II, he is stationed in the Solomon Islands and befriends a local rancher.
After a Japanese bombing raid, the rancher asks Parker for help rescuing a filly that has been injured. Parker ends up taking the horse to the Navy base and training her. She eventually becomes a morale booster for the sailors, as well as the unit's mascot.
Bess learns a number of tricks, including running to a sandbagged cave for protection whenever the air raid siren sounds. This leads to those who knew her giving her the nickname "Foxhole Flicka", after the horse in the 1941 children's book My Friend Flicka.
When Parker receives his orders to return to the U.S., he is denied permission to take Bess with him. He eventually either receives permission, or makes the right people think he received permission, and is allowed to build a stall on a ship for Bess.
According to Parker family lore, President Franklin D. Roosevelt's wife, Eleanor Roosevelt, heard of Parker's actions and convinced the president to grant permission to bring Bess home.
After the war, Parker was approached by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer to film several movies with Bess. Gallant Bess was the first to be filmed and was to be a true account of Bess' rescue, however, the movie was written such that the first half of the movie, until the character "Tex" joins the Navy, was purely fictional. The rest of the movie closely resembled the true account, but still with much artistic license.
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Wikipedia