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ThedevilChoose When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

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.

Bob This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

aa56 Fictionalized account of some of the history of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. This is typical of "historical" films of the 1940s. Many of the Westerns made during this decade are as laughable as some of the nonfactual anti-Mormon rants posted here pretending to be reviews of "Brigham Young." As a Western history buff, I am dismayed at the historical inaccuracies of this film, but I am impressed by the effort to manage all of the people, wagons, and animals sloshing through mud and rivers. The sets and special effects are commendable. Too bad Scott Forbes of television's "The Adventures of Jim Bowie" was not old enough to portray Joseph Smith, for he resembles him more than any other actor I've seen.

mercuryix-1 I always liked Tyrone Power, but am embarrassed that he chose to perform the title character in this extremely propagandist and revisionist fiction of Brigham Young's life. I have no idea if Tyrone Power was Mormon or not, but don't understand why he would star in this if he wasn't; he portrays Brigham Young as a Frontier version of Christ, and I am not kidding; if you removed the 1800s trappings, you would think he was playing Christ in certain scenes. However, he plays his scenes so flatly and so earnestly, that it flattens out what is already a cartoonlike character.The movie naturally leaves out important pieces of information: that a Mormon expedition en route to Utah committed one of the worst slaughters of pilgrims in American history, because they were paranoid that the government was after them; when they discovered that the survivors of their attack were in act simply other pilgrims they talked them into coming out of hiding, then shot them all dead; except for the small children, whom they forcefully adopted into their new cult. This massacre only became known 20 years later, and the government out of obligation chose one scapegoat to hang, as they couldn't be bothered to investigate the scope of this atrocity and prosecute the dozens of Mormon men who shot the Pilgrims in the head. The massacre is actually much worse than this, and easily searchable. Brigham Young was alive during this time, and denied it ever happened, although he had been advised it had occurred.The movie also leaves out the fact that Joseph Smith had served time in jail for conning people out of money multiple times; by promising to find water for them with special "stones" he possessed. He used this trick later when he claimed to have "Seer stones" to translate the golden plates he claimed to have found.During Mormonism's initial spread, women were actually kidnapped away from their husbands and families in neighboring states and forced to marry Mormons who already had multiple wives. The government never bothered to investigate these abductions, though they were recorded in the states where they occurred.Joseph Smith was not assassinated; he had come to a new town to spread his religion and gather more wives, and the townspeople tried to lynch him; he shot three of them dead before they managed to kill this cynical huckster.This movie is an artifact of its time; it is useful in demonstrating how dangerous whitewashing history and religions can be. Someday L. Ron Hubbard will be seen as the Christ figure who was shown Scientology by God; today in Russia, Stalin is actually being considered by the Russian Orthodox Church as a candidate for sainthood; a monster who murdered up to 30 million of his own people during his time as dictator. Whenever you see any movie like Brigham Young that portrays a historical figure in Christlike terms, be very suspicious. It's not as harmless as it seems....Also be very suspicious of glowing reviews of a movie made 70 years ago, by people watching it today and calling it the most brilliant, accurate historical drama you can see. It makes you wonder what their relationship is to the religion this movie is a tribute to.

calvinnme It must have been a difficult thing to make a movie in 1940 about the Mormons in the 19th century with polygamy being practiced by them at that time, but Daryl F. Zanuck gave it a try, even managing to get it past the production code and the censors of the time. He is definitely trying to parallel the trek of the Israelites from Egypt to the promised land headed by Moses with the Mormons traveling from Nauvoo to Salt Lake headed by Brigham Young. There are some colorful characters thrown in such as John Caradine's Porter Rockwell, a rather wild scout, who pulls his guns on a prosecutor during a trial so that Brigham Young (Dean Jagger) can have a chance to speak in Joseph Smith's defense, and the judge lets him get away with that?? Then there is also a romance thrown in with Mormon Jonathan Kent (Tyrone Power) and non-Mormon Zina Webb (Linda Darnell) slowly falling for each other as they travel across the continent with the Mormons. When Jonathan proposes marriage, Zina has reservations - first off, she is not a Mormon, and more importantly, she doesn't want to be the first of many Mrs.Kents. Her reservations were probably justified.There is even a bad guy in the (fictional) person of Angus Duncan (Brian Donlevy) who claims that Joseph Smith told him that he was to head the church in case of his death, and then causes trouble for Brigham Young every step of the way, including trying to get the Mormons to follow him to California rather than stop at Salt Lake. And yes, Angus is just like Edward G. Robinson's trouble making character in "The Ten Commandments", but remember, this film was made sixteen years before "Ten Commandments". The whole time, as Brigham makes decisions that effect the lives of all of the Mormons, he confides in wife Mary Ann that he is not sure that he is being led by God to make all of these decisions, so that he carries a burden of feeling that he could be misleading the others when he tells them to do this or that, but all the while his heart is in the right place. The film brings up some valid points to anybody that believes in God - How do you really know when He is speaking to you? How do you know a true prophet from a false one? I'm no expert on LDS history, in fact I'm not LDS at all, but if you want a rousing Western adventure that is a little different you might give this one a try. This film must have been somewhat convincing to non-Mormons as a realistic portrayal of what happened, because I distinctly remember this film being shown in elementary school back in history class when I was growing up in Texas! Do note that Dallas, Texas was probably lacking in large numbers of people who were neither a Baptist nor a Methodist back in 1967. Catch this one if you can. The performances are excellent even if the history may be a little off.

D H I'm LDS, with a significant interest in history, and although this film was OK, and I enjoyed the cast, the story was inaccurate and somewhat glossy in many places.In contrast to some of the other reviews, I'd note that Joseph Smith was arrested on a legitimate charge. He destroyed a newspaper press and the papers in Nauvoo. Freedom of the press is protected in the US under the constitution, so he broke the law. Further, having read that edition of the Nauvoo expositor I find that although there is hyperbole within it the basis of its claims are founded in fact, revealing that Joseph taught polygamy long before it was openly announced. Having read Richard Lyman Bushman's 'Rough Stone Rolling', and Todd Compton's 'In Sacred Loneliness' Smith is also acknowledged by Church Historians to have married 11 women that were actually married to other men alive at the time - some of which he had sent away on missions before proposing to their wives whilst they were away serving. So if anything, this movie underplays it.Brigham Young, was a strong leader, and he did indeed establish SLC, and build a thriving community there. Our history is far more troubled and nuanced than is portrayed in this movie. The story did little to portray a well rounded view of the harsh reality both within and without the church.