Annie Oakley (1935) Movie Review

Annie Oakley is a 1935 classic western movie directed by George Stevens and stars the legendary Barbara Stanwyck as the equally legendary but real western icon Annie Oakley. The film tells the life of the female sharpshooter and her romantic relationship with Toby Walker. 

First thing you should know is that this a highly fictionalized version of Annie's real life and becomes more palatable for a Hollywood audience but it's also perfectly structured as a western melodramatic story. So I will review it as it's own thing. The good news is that it works, being a highly enjoyable piece of old Hollywood, if perhaps somewhat dated. 

This was a pretty enjoyable and riveting old-timey western spectacle. The main conflict probably gets lost a bit in between the different shows and shooting sequences but it's entertaining all throughout. I liked the chemistry between the two leads and their relationship was very solidly constructed and performed by the actors, whose on screen presence is quite engaging.

Annie is a nice feminist character in western cinema, often being more capable and talented at shooting than her male counterparts (something incredibly obvious if you know anything about the title character), however, in a key scene for the plot she misses intentionally and makes her family lose money. Now, you might think that she missed because she wanted to protect her opponent's fragile masculinity or because of societal pressure but instead it is revealed shortly after that she did it because she had the hots for him. Ok then...

It's likely that the film is about the progress and continuous advancement in society from the late 1800's to the 1900's, embodied by the feminist Annie. I say this because the whole movie gives me a vibe of long gone male dominated era to enter a more egalitarian and modern one, this is further confirmed by the remarks some old people make about how women weren't allowed to do certain things like smoking in previous times, something laughable considering how normal those things were even during the making of the film, lines like that are delivered ironically and for perhaps satirical purposes.

Overall, with a nice pace and short runtime, Annie Oakley might me romanticized version of the female shooter's life story, but it stands on its own as a romantic and funny American myth (back when Hollywood could change things with a purpose), complete with a nice love story. There's no real "action" but it's far from boring.

This wouldn't be the first or last time Annie was featured in a film. The real life Annie shot a short film titled Annie Oakley in 1894, showing her shooting prowess. As a fictional character, Annie would later appear in the second best known movie about her: Annie Get Your Gun (1946) and several other films and TV shows would continue adding to her legend.