I recently found this movie in searching for Dee Brown's book at the local public library. I recall reading the book when it first came out, decades ago, and I was fascinated--a history book that I could not put down, just like The Exorcist (the book) when I first read it. Dee Brown's book was also a horror story, and the major horror was that it was real.
So knowing absolutely nothing about the movie, I borrowed it, thinking that it would be essentially a documentary. Was I wrong! I should have just checked out the book and read it again. Historic atrocities can only be properly dramatized by extraordinarily gifted filmmakers. Anything else is a reduction. But perhaps it is better if someone stumbles upon the Native American genocide done up as a popcorn movie, than never to have any idea at all.
The NY Times review complained of some rather obvious analogies to Iraq and Afghanistan. That further illustrates the reduction--would anyone dare use the Holocaust as an analogy for anything else? I don't fault the production, which was polished and accomplished. But HBO should have passed on this.
So knowing absolutely nothing about the movie, I borrowed it, thinking that it would be essentially a documentary. Was I wrong! I should have just checked out the book and read it again. Historic atrocities can only be properly dramatized by extraordinarily gifted filmmakers. Anything else is a reduction. But perhaps it is better if someone stumbles upon the Native American genocide done up as a popcorn movie, than never to have any idea at all.
The NY Times review complained of some rather obvious analogies to Iraq and Afghanistan. That further illustrates the reduction--would anyone dare use the Holocaust as an analogy for anything else? I don't fault the production, which was polished and accomplished. But HBO should have passed on this.