Movies: Pete Smith

The friendship between two orphans endures even though they grow up on opposite sides of the law and fall in love with the same woman....

La Fiesta de Santa Barbara is a 1935 American comedy short film directed by Louis Lewyn. It was nominated for an Academy Award at the 9th Academy Awards in 1936 for Best Short Subject (Color). It features a young, pre-stardom 13-year-old Judy Garland...

This Pete Smith Specialty showcases a group called the Water Bugs. Its members devise new ways to experience thrills on the waters of California lakes. Included in this film are paddle boats with outboard motors, two people using a single pair of wat...

Modern meteorology and a hard-working government weather team put their science and organization to work as a cold front moves from Alaska toward the citrus groves of Southern California. First, the scientists predict the storm's course, giving sever...

Pete Smith tells the story of 'Sparky', a German shepherd dog trained to lead his blind master, a country doctor who lost his sight in a fire, and now has to depend upon the dog to lead him in his daily rounds. 'Sparky" was the dog who was responsibl...

Pete Smith would make a "Football Thrills of...." each year as part of his Pete Smith Specials. 1944 was in the midst of WW II and most of the college football teams across the nation had been decimated because most of their athletes were in some bra...

Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy are stopped by narrator Pete Smith for the purpose of showing the audience how much wood and wood by-products the average person carries....

A man looks at stacks of canisters of film on shelves. He pulls out a few to show real-life events caught on camera. He pulls out spools of film that include clips of the effects of heavy rain, of early attempts to fly, of an auto race with a spectac...

This short film shows U.S. Marines in training at a number of unidentified bases, with a focus on hand-to-hand combat....

This serious Pete Smith Specialty series entry encourages industry to hire people with disabilities to help with the war effort. As a boy, Ben Helwig was blinded in an accident while playing baseball. He eventually acquired a guide dog and now works ...

This Pete Smith Specialty short takes a humorous look at the inconsiderate pests whose annoying habits make enjoying a movie impossible....

It's Thanksgiving. Newlywed husband Abner Poodlebean faces the turkey his wife has prepared: she wants him to carve it at the table in front of her scowling family, and Abner has no idea how to proceed. The film's narrator has us cut away to the kitc...

Under Pete's Smith's narration, this one-reeler tells the story of the training of three new recruits in the Canadian Northwest Mounted. When they tire of the repetitive routine, a superior officer tells them the story of another Northwest Mounted Po...

This entry in the series starts with a "Wotaphony Newsreel," which contains feature stories with humorous commentary. Then we see "Passions of Horse Pistol Pete," produced by Super-Stupid Pictures. It consists of excerpts from an unidentified silent ...

The profession of capturing animals in action on celluloid is both an art and science. Some of the most exciting footage can be obtained in different ways. Examples are: a large herd, such as of reindeer, moving as one; slow motion footage of fast mo...

The unusual talents of Johnny Price, a minor league baseball pitcher and trick artist, are showcased in this Pete Smith Specialty. Among other talents, Mr. Price can throw two (and, in certain situations three) baseballs simultaneously to different p...

In this Pete Smith Specialty short, a series of vignettes illustrate some ways that mothers-in-law irritate, and/or cause problems for, their son-in-law....

A Pete Smith Specialty short on saving an important dinner after the household's cook suddenly quits....

Another in the long series of "Pete Smith" shorts from M-G-M in which William Newell meets and falls in love with Sally Payne, and begins to budget for their plans to get married. His budget, alas, does not include nor anticipate the plans of Sally a...

In this Pete Smith Specialty short, Dr. Harold E. Edgerton demonstrates stroboscopic photography, which he helped develop. This process allows us to see in slow motion what happens during events that occur too fast to be seen by the naked eye. Exampl...