djexplorer
Joined Apr 2000
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djexplorer's rating
Fascinating amount of detail on AmerIndian history.
It's also however extremely one sided.
We don't hear about all of the endemic massacres by Indians of whites from the get go, through the whole thing.
We also don't get any context. I.e., everyone believed in conquest against deeply foreign peoples not sharing the same religion/world view in the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries.
Certainly AmerIndians did, most of whom lived in states of endemic (as in yearly or more often) warfare, including often the extremely cruel torture of their captured enemies. E.g. the Hurons in common with many Great Lake tribes skinned alive their captives in ritual fashion back in their own home villages. For those not committed to reading source history, the movie Black Robe (which takes a quite neutral and or mutually critical cultural stance) is informative in this regard.
The current view that conquest is horrible and likely to be called genocide is unique, at least among winning societies (and usually among everyone), in world history.
The AmerIndians were the ones who taught total war to the whites early in the 1600s near the Atlantic coast, killing old women and children, as well as all men combatants (or not), and taking the younger attractive women as additional wives / concubines / sex slaves. This had been the form of warfare they had waged amongst themselves before first contact with Europeans.
Read Thomas Sowell in "Conquest and Cultures" on the Amerindian issues. Sober, balanced, and most interesting.
There's no question that Euro-Americans committed many atrocities against AmerIndians, as amply reported in this series. But to watch this series you'd think that Indians never killed their enemy's women and children or took them as slaves. In fact many tribes usually did one or the other as a matter of their avowed tribal political and religious policy whenever they had the chance whenever they were at war.
In contrast it was never or almost never the policy of the British or national American government to kill not only enemy men (combatants) but also women and children -- although it certainly sometimes was the policy of some local militia commanders, and later of some great plains and western Army commanders -- and sometimes in a winking way some frontier governors. However, shamefully, the "removal", i.e. "ethnic cleansing" of AmerIndians to points ever further to western semi or actual badlands was far too often official policy. This was partly in response to endemic guerrilla war and partly simply in response to endemic lobbying by land hungry whites (the only side of it we hear in this one sided, propaganda-lite series). Andrew Jackson's removal policy against the successfully settled, agricultural, for the most part no longer guerrilla raiding, and semi-assimilating Cherokee, known as the "trail of tears", is probably the most shameful of all instances of this. This is of course amply reporter here, though also of course, with the Cherokees totally and completely without fault or threat.
All history has some point of view. At a (desireable) minimus, one always has to edit what down to what is most important. Nonetheless, when the "victim" (under the approach of this series and many other works) is virtually completely without fault (a rare reference to increasing alcoholism solely of course as a response to victimization not really excepted), and certainly without any independent capacity for aggression other than belated and regretfully ineffective defense, a work may be hard to distinguish from propaganda.
Now if two competing propagandas on the same topic were aired back to back, that would have been another thing.
It's also however extremely one sided.
We don't hear about all of the endemic massacres by Indians of whites from the get go, through the whole thing.
We also don't get any context. I.e., everyone believed in conquest against deeply foreign peoples not sharing the same religion/world view in the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries.
Certainly AmerIndians did, most of whom lived in states of endemic (as in yearly or more often) warfare, including often the extremely cruel torture of their captured enemies. E.g. the Hurons in common with many Great Lake tribes skinned alive their captives in ritual fashion back in their own home villages. For those not committed to reading source history, the movie Black Robe (which takes a quite neutral and or mutually critical cultural stance) is informative in this regard.
The current view that conquest is horrible and likely to be called genocide is unique, at least among winning societies (and usually among everyone), in world history.
The AmerIndians were the ones who taught total war to the whites early in the 1600s near the Atlantic coast, killing old women and children, as well as all men combatants (or not), and taking the younger attractive women as additional wives / concubines / sex slaves. This had been the form of warfare they had waged amongst themselves before first contact with Europeans.
Read Thomas Sowell in "Conquest and Cultures" on the Amerindian issues. Sober, balanced, and most interesting.
There's no question that Euro-Americans committed many atrocities against AmerIndians, as amply reported in this series. But to watch this series you'd think that Indians never killed their enemy's women and children or took them as slaves. In fact many tribes usually did one or the other as a matter of their avowed tribal political and religious policy whenever they had the chance whenever they were at war.
In contrast it was never or almost never the policy of the British or national American government to kill not only enemy men (combatants) but also women and children -- although it certainly sometimes was the policy of some local militia commanders, and later of some great plains and western Army commanders -- and sometimes in a winking way some frontier governors. However, shamefully, the "removal", i.e. "ethnic cleansing" of AmerIndians to points ever further to western semi or actual badlands was far too often official policy. This was partly in response to endemic guerrilla war and partly simply in response to endemic lobbying by land hungry whites (the only side of it we hear in this one sided, propaganda-lite series). Andrew Jackson's removal policy against the successfully settled, agricultural, for the most part no longer guerrilla raiding, and semi-assimilating Cherokee, known as the "trail of tears", is probably the most shameful of all instances of this. This is of course amply reporter here, though also of course, with the Cherokees totally and completely without fault or threat.
All history has some point of view. At a (desireable) minimus, one always has to edit what down to what is most important. Nonetheless, when the "victim" (under the approach of this series and many other works) is virtually completely without fault (a rare reference to increasing alcoholism solely of course as a response to victimization not really excepted), and certainly without any independent capacity for aggression other than belated and regretfully ineffective defense, a work may be hard to distinguish from propaganda.
Now if two competing propagandas on the same topic were aired back to back, that would have been another thing.
One of the best and most unique Westerns of all time, "High Plains Drifter" is probably the most interesting -- and controversial. Of course it's in the modern, non-mythological style, which neither glamorizes the old West, nor the moral codes of its protagonists. Yet this film is its own unique moral fable.
Clint is absolutely at the top of his acting game. Although there certainly is violence and dramatic shots of Western landscape here (particularly the stunning opening scenes), this is overwhelmingly a character drama. Nearly all the many characters of this plot become full real people. It's a tight, spare drama with little waste. You need to pay attention, or watch it several times. Or both, to get the most out of it.
What at first seems to be a shockingly amoral film, turns out to be one of the most thought provoking tales of social and personal morality and the need for personal courage I have seen. Like much of Eastwood's work, it's point of view is strongly Nietchzschian -- the extraordinary man surrounded by weaklings of various sorts. Yet this is no call for strong man rule -- it illustrates just what can happen when people are so weak as to need that. There are no pat answers here. Rather issues of right and wrong, survival and revenge, strength and weakness are dramatically played out in starkly different circumstances than most current day Americans have ever experienced.
What if an entire isolated town, a social system unto itself, is complicit in murder wholly to protect it's own illegally based prosperity? What if an entire town fears for its continued existence and physical safety in the face of hard and evil men -- who are returning to exact revenge for actual wrongs done to them by that town? What if this town, this social group, is filled with moral and physical cowards, who must look outside their own, to some strong individuals, for help? How far will they debase themselves in their need for external strength, and leadership?
Most shocking to today's audience will be Clint's early rape of the town's belle (and woman let's say of easily shifting alliances) Callie Travers. She clearly was trying to seduce the Stranger in her own game playing put down way, after she saw him establish dominance by blowing away the town's three gunfighters. But the Stranger then clearly takes her against her will, after he grows tired of her games. She's furious afterwards too, and tries to shoot him. An utterly clear case of rape in today's climate. No one will side with her, since this town needs this strongman. So she is defenceless, and without effective recourse. Further, the degree of her own moral compromise becomes clear when we see how easily Clint can seduce her once he has cemented his alpha domination of the town. It's clearly solely for that reason. "I don't eat with dogs" she says, at first resisting his request she join him for supper, still mad about her violation. "Oh, I think you might," Clint responds, "when it's the leader of the pack" and trains his steely gaze on her. She melts into his arms, and asks for thirty minutes, to make herself ready. This is fully believable; we've seen glimpses of the power games that make her tick from her first introduction. Her moral standing is even more compromised when in a flashback we see her next to one of the towns richest citizens (her lover?), an owner of the mine, looking impassively on as the town's paid assassins whip the town's Marshall to death. The upstanding Marshall had discovered that the mine, which is the reason for the towns prosperity and existence, is actually on government land, and felt he had to report it. Not just men, but women too can be guilty in this Eastwood film, and deserving of their own type of special punishment in this anarchic and unsocialized time and place.
In the end it's the townspeople themselves, and the assassins they had had unjustly imprisoned for something they didn't do, which destroy the town in an orgy of combat, cowardice, lack of leadership and self destruction. The Stranger steps back and has no part of this on either side, having already catalyzed it's fulsome unfolding. As the assassins look to be winning in destroying the town, belle Callie Tavers, rape "victim", switches sides again and professes her never faltering love and devotion to one of them, continued she says all the time he was in jail.
In contrast the hotel owner's wife, who Clint seduces rather than rapes, decides after their intimacy that she wants nothing more to do with the town or her marriage. She seems to have been ambivalent about the town's prior actions, had little direct role in them, and is now disgusted. Like the Stranger she stays out of the final melee, as she too prepares to move on.
You must be brave and strong, before you can be free and enforce some sort of moral decency, is one of the teachings of this most Clint of all Eastwood's movies. Moral platitudes and preaching, but the town's utterly ineffectual Preacher or others, is not enough. There is no big brother here to do it for these people -- these townspeople are on their own. And not up to the task. The degree to which the weak, including their women, will suck up to the strong and degrade themselves, particularly when they are moral as well as physical cowards, is another. Women are not always forces of moral good here (unlike in the vast majority of Westerns). Neither are they the worst forces of evil or cowardice. (And they don't get the worst revenge either.) This is a Western with an Old Testament feel to it.
As the film ends, what was earlier foreshadowed becomes crystal clear. The Stranger is the ghost or alter ego of the assassinated town Marshall. Whose grave is unmarked no longer.
It's a brilliant piece of work, and probably my favorite Western.
Clint is absolutely at the top of his acting game. Although there certainly is violence and dramatic shots of Western landscape here (particularly the stunning opening scenes), this is overwhelmingly a character drama. Nearly all the many characters of this plot become full real people. It's a tight, spare drama with little waste. You need to pay attention, or watch it several times. Or both, to get the most out of it.
What at first seems to be a shockingly amoral film, turns out to be one of the most thought provoking tales of social and personal morality and the need for personal courage I have seen. Like much of Eastwood's work, it's point of view is strongly Nietchzschian -- the extraordinary man surrounded by weaklings of various sorts. Yet this is no call for strong man rule -- it illustrates just what can happen when people are so weak as to need that. There are no pat answers here. Rather issues of right and wrong, survival and revenge, strength and weakness are dramatically played out in starkly different circumstances than most current day Americans have ever experienced.
What if an entire isolated town, a social system unto itself, is complicit in murder wholly to protect it's own illegally based prosperity? What if an entire town fears for its continued existence and physical safety in the face of hard and evil men -- who are returning to exact revenge for actual wrongs done to them by that town? What if this town, this social group, is filled with moral and physical cowards, who must look outside their own, to some strong individuals, for help? How far will they debase themselves in their need for external strength, and leadership?
Most shocking to today's audience will be Clint's early rape of the town's belle (and woman let's say of easily shifting alliances) Callie Travers. She clearly was trying to seduce the Stranger in her own game playing put down way, after she saw him establish dominance by blowing away the town's three gunfighters. But the Stranger then clearly takes her against her will, after he grows tired of her games. She's furious afterwards too, and tries to shoot him. An utterly clear case of rape in today's climate. No one will side with her, since this town needs this strongman. So she is defenceless, and without effective recourse. Further, the degree of her own moral compromise becomes clear when we see how easily Clint can seduce her once he has cemented his alpha domination of the town. It's clearly solely for that reason. "I don't eat with dogs" she says, at first resisting his request she join him for supper, still mad about her violation. "Oh, I think you might," Clint responds, "when it's the leader of the pack" and trains his steely gaze on her. She melts into his arms, and asks for thirty minutes, to make herself ready. This is fully believable; we've seen glimpses of the power games that make her tick from her first introduction. Her moral standing is even more compromised when in a flashback we see her next to one of the towns richest citizens (her lover?), an owner of the mine, looking impassively on as the town's paid assassins whip the town's Marshall to death. The upstanding Marshall had discovered that the mine, which is the reason for the towns prosperity and existence, is actually on government land, and felt he had to report it. Not just men, but women too can be guilty in this Eastwood film, and deserving of their own type of special punishment in this anarchic and unsocialized time and place.
In the end it's the townspeople themselves, and the assassins they had had unjustly imprisoned for something they didn't do, which destroy the town in an orgy of combat, cowardice, lack of leadership and self destruction. The Stranger steps back and has no part of this on either side, having already catalyzed it's fulsome unfolding. As the assassins look to be winning in destroying the town, belle Callie Tavers, rape "victim", switches sides again and professes her never faltering love and devotion to one of them, continued she says all the time he was in jail.
In contrast the hotel owner's wife, who Clint seduces rather than rapes, decides after their intimacy that she wants nothing more to do with the town or her marriage. She seems to have been ambivalent about the town's prior actions, had little direct role in them, and is now disgusted. Like the Stranger she stays out of the final melee, as she too prepares to move on.
You must be brave and strong, before you can be free and enforce some sort of moral decency, is one of the teachings of this most Clint of all Eastwood's movies. Moral platitudes and preaching, but the town's utterly ineffectual Preacher or others, is not enough. There is no big brother here to do it for these people -- these townspeople are on their own. And not up to the task. The degree to which the weak, including their women, will suck up to the strong and degrade themselves, particularly when they are moral as well as physical cowards, is another. Women are not always forces of moral good here (unlike in the vast majority of Westerns). Neither are they the worst forces of evil or cowardice. (And they don't get the worst revenge either.) This is a Western with an Old Testament feel to it.
As the film ends, what was earlier foreshadowed becomes crystal clear. The Stranger is the ghost or alter ego of the assassinated town Marshall. Whose grave is unmarked no longer.
It's a brilliant piece of work, and probably my favorite Western.
I only saw the last half of this New Zealand film on Sundance cable this evening.
Of course I wouldn't normally comment after an incomplete viewing, much less only half. I'm only doing so because so far there are no comments on IMDb, and this one deserves them. But given my partial viewing, I won't venture any more comment than this:
It's a very well filmed, intense psychological drama among four women and one man. It definitely brings a fresh perspective. It's well acted, and riveting, for those interested in intelligent, as opposed to least common denominator, dramas.
I will definitely be viewing the whole thing.
Of course I wouldn't normally comment after an incomplete viewing, much less only half. I'm only doing so because so far there are no comments on IMDb, and this one deserves them. But given my partial viewing, I won't venture any more comment than this:
It's a very well filmed, intense psychological drama among four women and one man. It definitely brings a fresh perspective. It's well acted, and riveting, for those interested in intelligent, as opposed to least common denominator, dramas.
I will definitely be viewing the whole thing.