Very very predictable, including the post credit scene !!!

Let's be realistic.

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

In 1880 St. Louis, well-dressed socialite Katharine Hepburn (as Lutie Cameron) prepares for her fancy wedding to well-heeled rancher Spencer Tracy (as James "Jim" Brewton), but he is delayed due to business concerns. Traveling to New Mexico, Ms. Hepburn is hitched to Mr. Tracy after meeting his mutually attractive rival Melvyn Douglas (as Brice Chamberlain). This "love triangle" eventually produces wild Robert Walker (as Brock). Well-respected director Elia Kazan practically disowned this film; it's easy to see why, with Tracy and Hepburn appearing out of place in a decades-spanning, overblown pseudo-western soap opera epic. The reported effort to make Tracy appear sober and Hepburn appear glamorous was successful, at least. A thick layer of MGM production gloss doesn't enhance the story as much as it does the watching.***** The Sea of Grass (2/26/47) Elia Kazan ~ Katharine Hepburn, Spencer Tracy, Robert Walker, Melvyn Douglas

Why do I get the feeling some folks know little about Spencer Tracy? For example, Kazan's alleged quote of "Tracy did not like horses and horses did not like Tracy either" (per Ciment's book). Excuse me, but how could a man who loved to play polo, which Tracy did and did a lot in his younger days and against studio wishes, not like horses? I've played polo and if you don't like horses (and they don't like you) you won't be playing the game more than once or twice. Maybe the quote was made for the more obvious reason: to justify Kazan turning out a movie that was below his abilities? If true that one of Kazan's excuses for the painful experience of directing the movie was not filming on location, I can't totally disagree, but then again a good many great films were not filmed on location, so this excuse only holds so much water. And how can one think that the movie is a "cattlemen vs. homesteaders" film? That's the setting, and it is the trigger of the conflict between the main characters, which leads to the betrayal, which is the center piece of the story, but that certainly isn't the movie. I grant you, it's not one of Tracy's best, but he does the best he can with the lame Marguerite Roberts' script. Even if this movie had been shot on location, it doesn't change the glaring fact that a bad script is still a bad script. If you believe Tracy was sleepwalking, then you have to also believe Kazan was on life support and Roberts was dead, from the neck up, while scripting this one. If Tracy's at fault for anything, it's for trying to save the film, which is more than it deserved.

This movie is tough to love. Partly this is due to the setting of the film (nothing but grasslands as far as the eyes can see), but most of it is because the two main characters are so flawed and unlikable. In some ways this unlikability is good, as too often Hollywood films of the 30s and 40s present people in a "black/white" fashion and people who fall somewhere towards the middle are seldom seen. However, such "gray" characters are tough to bond with or care about, so I can understand why the film makers generally avoided this. Katherine Hepburn seems like a good character through much of the film, but midway through it, she shows a self-centeredness that make it tough to really see the tragedy in her life. Her initially living with the cruel and lawless Tracy is unforgivable, but her having an affair and then leaving her kids (one the bastard) with Tracy and not seeing them for almost 20 years make her very, very tough to like. Tracy, on the other hand, does stay to care for his kids--but in a very self-serving fashion. He is an emotionally constricted and yet over-indulgent father. As a human being, he's a lot worse--killing or nearly killing farmers because he saw the plains as his own personal property. The central message that eventually these farmers contributed to the destruction of the plains is lost--Tracy's not fighting against the farmers due to any love of nature or a desire to preserve the land. No, he's just a greedy rancher that will do ANYTHING to keep the land without fences.Despite the problems with the characters, the film is exquisitely filmed--with some of the more beautiful camera shots I've seen in a long time. This film is worth seeing, but not one I would recommend you rush to see.

Considering that Sea of Grass is helmed by a director who's not familiar with the western milieu it's amazing that it comes off as well as it does. Elia Kazan is so much better in an urban setting like On the Waterfront. Yet Tracy and Hepburn do make this work on some levels.John Wayne in McLintock and Spencer Tracy in Sea of Grass have the same view of the prarie. Both films take the side of the cattle rancher as opposed to the farmer. Certainly other films like Shane make the farmer the good guy. But events here show that Tracy was right about the prarie as his arch rival in politics and love, Melvyn Douglas, ruefully points out.Tracy and Wayne also have spousal problems, although certainly Wayne handles his with a tad more humor. One thing that Maureen O'Hara does and Katharine Hepburn doesn't is share his vision of the prarie. She befriends the farmer family nearby and that is what causes the rift between her and Tracy.McLintock is a comedy and Sea of Grass is a western soap opera. Kazan was lucky in casting folks like Edgar Buchanan and Harry Carey who knew their way around a western. Robert Walker was taking some tentative steps toward a similar role in Vengeance Valley. He only appears in the last half hour of the film as the kid with dubious paternity, but you will remember him.Katharine Hepburn would have to wait another 28 years before doing another traditional western in Rooster Cogburn. Eula Goodnight is certainly light years from Lutie Cameron. Colonel Jim Brewton though is the same type cattle baron as G.W. McLintock.I think the film is more for fans of soap opera than for fans of westerns. And certainly it's for fans of Spence and Kate.