Americas 250th Birthday Cinemathon #31: Tombstone (1993)

 

One of YouTube channel Honest Trailers’ jokes about the movie Tombstone is that it answers the questions “what if you only made a movie out of the good parts.” Only modestly successful at the box office, this new telling of Wyatt Earp and his adventures around Tombstone became a staple of Cable television and is now regarded as one of the most awesome (and manly) movies ever made. This was a real treat on my watchlist, as it somehow is generally accurate while still retaining the feel of an entertaining blockbuster. It’s got an unbelievably full and incredible cast, and it’s a testament to both the actors and the screenplay that nearly all of them leave their mark.

What’s interesting about Tombstone was that it was a sincere update of the classic Western outline. Our protagonist or protagonists show up in a town riddled by chaos. Though reluctant, they ultimately have to use violence to clean up the place. Indeed, this might be the last high-profile Western to not be a deconstructive film. If you ask me, the idea of the deconstructionist Western has been well overplayed by now. Film reporters and critics are always gushing about films for challenging the classic American myth of the West, but these days it’s hardly a brave and bold stance within Hollywood. But that’s not what this review is about, so I’ll get back on topic.

Before going further, I should note that there are two major sources of the inaccuracies in Tombstone. One is that the timeline is simplified and condensed. The time of the Earps’ arrival in Tombstone to the Vendetta Ride was between two and three years. The movie makes it feel much shorter. Also, the characters were up to a lot more, often changing jobs and in the case of love interest Josephine actually leaving the town for a while before coming back. One switcheroo in time is that Doc Holliday seems to die shortly after the Vendetta Ride and then Wyatt links back up with his romantic interest. Actually, Holliday lingered on until 1887, about five years after the movie ends.

Americas 250th Birthday Cinemathon #30: Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid (1973)

 Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid is one of the few movies on my list which I watched for the first time. Directed by Sam Peckinpah in the New Hollywood era of the 70s, I was very interested to see what it would be like. Peckinpah directed the famous Wild Bunch, a big deconstruction of the western. However his follow-up, Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid, has not fared so well in memory. It did rather poorly on its initial release and was panned critically to boot. The main cause was MGM’s president James Aubrey, who first interfered with time and budget constraints and then, more infamously, forced cuts that undermined the story and themes of the movie.

The theatrical cut removed almost 20 minutes of the movie. Since then Warner Brothers and the Criterion Channel have attempted to release the definitive cut. Apparently I should have watched Criterion’s 50^th anniversary version, but I opted for the Final Preview Cut which is the longest at 124 minutes. Strangely it was a mix of high blu-ray quality and grainy film. I won’t get too much more into the movie’s troubled production, but if you’re into reading about behind-the-scenes chaos this movie is a goldmine.

On to the history, Billy the Kid is one of the more romanticized outlaws of American history. This can be attributed to the very young age when he started his outlaw career and some of the sympathetic circumstances that propelled him to notoriety. As William Bonney he had committed various crimes in his teenage years and had been one of the more dangerous shooters of the Lincoln County War in New Mexico. Even though he was hardly the only one to kill in the war, Bonney was still labeled an outlaw. He gave key testimony in a murder trial in exchange for amnesty from Governor Lew Wallace (Jason Robards plays him for one scene), but did not get what he asked for. From there he became a more hardened outlaw, leading to the events depicted in Peckinpah’s film.

Americas 250th Birthday Cinemathon #29: Son of the Morning Star (1991)

 

I’ve actually already written a review of this one, so this is a revised version with a little more to it. Son of the Morning Star is a two-part TV adaptation of Evan S. Connell's non-fiction book of the same name. The title is one of the Cheyenne names for Colonel George Custer, who led a daytime assault on their camp on the Washita River. I was originally drawn to this film after watching the heavily inaccurate Errol Flynn as Custer flick They Died with Their Boots On. Unfortunately the mini-series (which did not perform to expectations) has still not received a cleaned up DVD or streaming release, so I had to watch a VHS rip on Youtube (yes, it's completely free, albeit with some ad breaks). While the picture quality is fuzzy, I have to say that I was very pleased with this "movie" and feel that it deserves more attention for being the most accurate coverage of Custer and Little Bighorn. I’ve even rewatched it twice.

George Armstrong Custer literally joined the American Civil War out of West Point. His audacious bravery propelled his career, and he ended the war as both a brevet general of volunteers and one of General Phil Sheridan’s favorites. With the army shrinking, he was shunted down to the rank of colonel (a common problem for many who earned extra start leading volunteers in the Civil War) and was sent out West to deal several Indian wars. Custer’s vanity and recklessness often got him into hot water with his superiors, but it was his last stand and death at the Little Bighorn that ensured he would be remembered for all of American history.

Americas 250th Birthday Cinemathon #28: Broken Arrow (1950)

 

Broken Arrow tells of the real-life friendship between Apache chief Cochise and prospector Tom Jeffords. Famously the two were actually able to end, at least for a few years, much of the warring between Americans and Apaches. To understand the context of the Apache Wars in the 1860s and 1870s, we’d have to start in 1861. A group of Apache raiders kidnapped a 12-year old boy. Lieutenant George Bascom of the US Army invited Cochise to meet him, making the common mistake of assuming that all Indians of one people answered to one leader. Cochise had no part in the kidnapping and even offered to help get the kid back, but Bascom planned to imprison him. Cochise escaped and the Apache Wars returned with a fierce intensity.

The movie generally follows the events of history, but with quite a few changes and additions. One is the look of Tom Jeffords, who like many Americans of his time sported a good amount of facial hair, but here shows up played by a clean-shaven Jimmy Stewart. Older and having been affected by his service in World War II, Stewart could no longer play the folksy and often idealistic hero, and his career looked uncertain. He found new life, however, as a western actor (I highly recommend his Anthony Mann westerns where he’s a more cynical protagonist).

But enough about an actor’s history. Stewart’s Jeffords surprises the Apache by rescuing one of their wounded youths and being reasonable. As his relationship with Cochise starts to develop, he’s able to negotiate an end to Apache attacks on the overland mail. This is based on a claim that the real Jeffords made, but historians have disputed this. Jeffords definitely, however, helped bring Apaches and US officials together for peace talks. In 1872 he accompanied one-armed General Oliver O. Howard to Cochise’s place. Howard was a firm Christian not given to lying or aggression, so Grant thought that, paired with Jeffords, he’s be a great for a peace-seeking mission. Basil Ruysdael plays Howard in this movie. He does a good job, but Howard is way too old here. The movie further leaves out the famous moment when the religious officer shouted his thanks to God and frightened the Apache (they thought he was summoning magic).

Americas 250th Birthday Cinemathon #27: Lincoln (2012)

Steven Spielberg’s Lincoln was one of his long-running projects. Earlier on, it was to be a more general biopic with Liam Neeson as the famed Abraham Lincoln. By the time it finally swung into proper production, however, Neeson dropped out and Daniel Day-Lewis took his place. Wisely, Spielberg also abandoned the idea of a film covering years, if not decades, of Lincoln’s life, a common mistake of biopics that results in unfocused, hole-ridden storylines. Instead he zeroed in on the president’s attempt to get the 13^th Amendment passed in the House of Representatives.

The 13^th Amendment was to end slavery once and for all in the United States. It was the culmination of years of policy development during the Civil War. Though he hated slavery, Lincoln knew he could not abolish it and instead had supported the Republican Party’s views of preventing its expansion into new territories. As the war progressed, however, the Union Army and Federal government could not ignore the fact that slave labor fueled the Confederacy, so runaway slaves were accepted as “contraband” enemy property. By 1865 many now believed that slavery had to be abolished, whether out of moral concerns or the pragmatic belief that it would result in more strife down the road.

The 13^th Amendment is opposed by various Democrats and some of the more conservative Republicans. A greater threat is a Confederate peace commission. If slavery’s continued existence in a restored Union ensures that a long, bloody war can finally end right now, many in the House will see the 13^th as a guaranteed war to keep the body count going. Many historians disputed the central conflict of Lincoln, arguing that there was no way slavery could remain intact after the Civil War, even if the amendment initially failed to pass.

Americas 250th Birthday Cinemathon #26: Cold Mountain (2003)

Civil War historian Gary Gallagher has noted the stark difference in fictional portrayals of the Northern and Southern home fronts. Stories set in the North like the Gary Cooper film Friendly Persuasion and Louisa May Alcott’s famous novel (with its own numerous cinematic adaptations) Little Women are more slice-of-life affairs with occasional wartime disturbances. By contrast, stories set beyond the battle lines in the South are deeply melodramatic affairs involving great matters of life and death, often with deeply tragic results. This makes sense, as most of the war was fought in the South. Everybody is familiar with the upper-class dramas, such as Gone with the Wind (which almost made my list, but was not included because I already had so many long movies from this era). Cold Mountain, however, takes a look at the lower classes, with almost no plantations in sight.

Cold Mountain was a huge labor of love for director Anthony Minghella. He was quite taken with the themes and prose of Charles Frazier’s source novel of the same name. Frazier grew up in western North Carolina and became interested in the history of the region, particularly the Blue Mountains. Using his research, he wrote the tale of William Inman, a Confederate soldier who deserts after receiving a wound, and his attempt to return to his love, Ada Monroe, at Cold Mountain. In the movie this pair of main protagonists is played by Jude Law and Nicole Kidman. Determined to get the scenery right, Minghella actually filmed most of the movie in mountainous parts of Romania (including Transylvania!) to avoid the hassle of modern additions to the American South.

The setting of western North Carolina is key to the story. Mountainous regions of the South were not conducive to the labor-intensive plantations, where dozens to hundreds of black slaves worked. Since they had not built such a critical reliance on this system of forced labor, areas such as Northwest Arkansas, East Tennessee, and most famously West Virginia were thus more Unionist, seeing the Confederacy as an invention of the larger slaveholders. North Carolina had its fair share of Unionists in the west, though they don’t appear in lieu of disaffected Confederates and pacifists. The slavery issue is actually not all that present. There’s one scene where Inman comes across a crowd of fugitive slaves, and Ada Monroe and her preacher father (Donald Sutherland) own a few who are barely seen and run away offscreen. Otherwise slavery is mostly mentioned as the cause of the elites who make the lower-class whites go off to war in their stead.

Americas 250th Birthday Cinemathon #25: Dances with Wolves (1990)

Dances with Wolves is one of the more important films on my 250^th anniversary watchlist. While movies sympathetic to American Indians had been made, it had never been done on such a scale, and certainly had not drawn as much commercial and critical success. This came as a surprise because everyone thought the director and actor, Kevin Costner, was wasting his time on a guaranteed failure. He literally spent five years of his life trying to get the movie made, turning down major movie roles while he sank his own money into the project. It was seen as a vanity project doomed to fail. Instead it was a vanity project that succeeded.

The movie is said to be based on a novel by Michael Blake, but actually the novel originated as a screenplay by the same author. It was turned into a book so that Costner could have better luck attracting support for his film. That being said, there is a stark difference. The novel is set in the American Southwest with the Comanches, but it turned out they couldn’t get enough buffalo in that region to film, so the location was turned to the northern Great Plains with the Lakota Sioux. However, there’s a scene where an old Indian holds up a conquistador helmet to explain previous European incursions. This is an obvious holdover from the earlier script and novel, as 15^th-16^th Century Spaniards never clashed and likely never even met the Sioux.

Americas 250th Birthday Cinemathon #24: Gangs of New York (2002)

 

Gangs of New York is based on, or rather inspired by, journalist Herbert Asbury’s 1928 book of the same name. It was one of Martin Scorsese’s many long-running passion projects, and he allegedly spent over 20 years developing his ideas and then finally filming it. Scorsese was drawn to the criminal underworld of the 19^th century, a subject often ignored in favor of the Old West or the wider political movements and conflicts such as the Civil War. He saw a real conflict over the direction of the country. The director was ultimately unsatisfied with the final product, as producer Harvey Weinstein forced cuts (Scorsese is known for his looong running times). Weinstein also oversaw the addition of voiceover narration by Leonardo DiCaprio which is often unnecessary.

Still, this is probably the only major film to touch on a lot of aspects of 19^th Century urban life and was intended as a springboard for a new subgenre of crime and historical films (it was not to be). Scorsese really wanted to show the breadth of 19^th Century New York, so there are anachronisms. The movie is clearly set in 1862-1863, the Civil War being a major background event that eventually intrudes on the characters’ gang war. However, the Nativist movement was much stronger in the 1850s. While immigration was still a major social and political issue, the organized Nativists, expressed by the Native American Party, lost their steam as the sectional conflict took over. On the opposite end, Boss Tweed and his powerful and corrupt Tammany Hall Democrat machine didn’t kick into gear until after the Civil War. Here he’s a major player from the get-go, played by Jim Broadbent.

Americas 250th Birthday Cinemathon #23: Gettysburg (1993) part 2 of 2

 

Fremantle (James Lancaster) carries tea, because he's British, you see.

Arthur Fremantle

Before I get into a general rundown of the battle scenes and a few other points, I should provide some background on Lieutenant-Colonel Arthur Fremantle (James Lancaster). A British officer, he wanted to see the American War up close, particularly from the Southern side. Believing him an official observer, the Confederates gave him access to various major generals and politicians. Amusingly, however, Fremantle was actually on a leave of absence, and this was his idea of a vacation. He had quite the trip, starting with a pursuit by a Union blockade vessel, getting a look at Texas, and viewing Bragg’s Army of Tennessee.

Then he got to personally travel with the Army of Northern Virginia to Gettysburg. After witnessing the greatest American battle, he  traveled to New York for departure, arriving just in time to witness the infamous Draft Riots. He published his experience in the book Three Months in the Southern States. In the movie Fremantle adds a little color (literally with his inaccurate red uniform) and humor while getting the Confederate characters to open up about their causes and beliefs. In a wider-scoped Gettysburg movie not based on Shaara’s novel, his scenes would definitely be considered unnecessary fluff. Now to look at the action itself.

June

I love the opening credits. Backed by Randy Edelman’s stirring, if heavily synthesized musical themes, photos emerge, first of the historical figure, then the actor in costume portraying him. On earlier rewatches this becomes a fun game of identifying which movie character belongs to each photo. W. Morgan Sheppard, who already plays Trimble, provides the opening narration over a map showing the army’s routes northward.

Americas 250th Birthday Cinemathon #23: Gettysburg (1993) part 1 of 2

 

This is the movie that led to my becoming a history buff, especially of the Civil War. Gettysburg was a film over a decade in the making. It’s source material was Michael Shaara’s historical novel Killer Angels, which attempted to dive into the heads of several real-life Union and Confederate figures in America’s greatest battle. Maxwell was unable to get the backing to actually make the movie because of some notable failed epic films, but finally Ted Turner, who also saw the idea of a Civil War mini-series as a passion project, finally got things going.

Gettysburg was originally made to be a mini-series for TNT, but Turner was so impressed with the final product that, with a few scenes cut, it was given a limited theatrical release first. Thanks to its four hour length, the longest for any theatrical release in American history, it didn’t make back its budget, but it got lots of praise and positive buzz. Thus it was a smash hit on TV and home video. I remember my family having the two-tape set. It’s size always impressed me and it was watched a lot in the house. After seeing a few other images in my family’s book collection and getting the BMC toy soldier set for my birthday, I one day decided to check out a couple books from the library and I turned into a Civil War nerd for the rest of my life.

For those who don’t know, Gettysburg is considered the greatest battle of the Civil War. It didn’t have the most men involved (that honor goes to the Battle of Fredericksburg), but it saw the heaviest casualties in killed and wounded. General Robert E. Lee, commander of the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia, wanted to take the war north and score a decisive victory that would end the war in his favor. Nearly by accident, the Confederate and Union Armies collided at Gettysburg on July 1, 1863. After three days of fighting, Lee’s army suffered its first massive defeat. Along with the loss of the last strongholds on the Mississippi River and the major Tennessee railroad junction of Chattanooga, this battle was a major turning point and is argued to have signaled the eventual defeat of the Confederacy.

Ted Turner (left) cameos as  Colonel Waller T. Patton, World War II general George Patton's great-uncle. Ron Maxwell stands to the right. (https://davethecaveman.blogspot.com/2018/11/my-favorite-films-gettysburg-1993.html)

By the way, if you’re wondering why the movie didn’t retain the title Killer Angels, marketing warned that people would think of biker gangs instead of the Civil War. Now into the movie’s content and historicity. I also already did a list of some historical inaccuracies, a few which I’ll touch on in this review, but others I won’t, so check it out.

Americas 250th Birthday Cinemathon #22: Glory (1989)

Glory tells the story of the 54^th Massachusetts, one of the first black Civil War regiments. One of the conditions of Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation was that, starting January 1, 1863, African-Americans could officially join the Union Army, though many were already giving a big hand with logistical support, thus freeing up more white troops to get to the front lines. The 54^th Massachusetts in particular received much attention because it had the full support of Massachusetts Governor John Andrew and saw action fairly quickly in the southeast around Charleston. Also, as an early black regiment, it got to have the state's distinction in its name while other units were listed as USCT (United States Colored Troops). Already made known in art and general histories, the regiment is certainly well known now because of its 1989 film adaptation.

The movie was the brainchild of New York cultural figure Lincoln Kirstein and screenwriter Kevin Jarre (adopted son of none other than Maurice Jarre, composer of Lawrence of Arabia). Both were inspired by the regiment’s monument in Boston (featured in the end credits), several books (including one by Kirstein himself), and Colonel Robert Gould Shaw’s letters. Shaw (Matthew Broderick) provides narration via his letters, but the quotes are a mix of real ones and fake ones to accommodate the changes made for the story.

Americas 250th Birthday Cinemathon #21: Gods and Generals (2003) part 2 of 2

 

Here is the second part of my Gods and Generals review, going through the film to look at the battles as well as a few other points I wanted to discuss.

First Bull Run

The movie begins with Lee meeting Francis Preston Blair, a major political figure at the time, to discuss an offer to command the Union Army. Lee refuses, citing that his primary loyalty is to Virginia and the if it secedes he will join it. It’s funny how all these Civil War films and shows always have Lee starting the war with his gray hair and beard. Actually, he had dark hair and just a mustache, and was even considered handsome for a man in his fifties. The stress of the war is what changed his look into the one familiar to us today.

Most of the first act focuses on Jackson, and outside of the Lee and Booth scenes this could have been the first part of a Jackson biopic. Now, I hadn’t seen Gods and Generals in ten years, so I was hit with a few fresh observations, and one is that there is actual no explanation for what exactly is going on militarily. Jackson’s brigade does a little training and then marches off for a battle. We don’t get any exposition about why the armies are clashing at Manassas Junction because everyone is too busy delivering speeches. They just go to a battle and start fighting.

Americas 250th Birthday Cinemathon #21: Gods and Generals (2003) part 1 of 2

General Intro

I’m finally into the Civil War proper, my favorite era of history. Because of my enthusiasm for the subject, a couple review are going to be long. That’s why the first movie for the war, Gods and Generals, is going to get a multi-part review.

Before the movie Gods and Generals was the prequel to Gettysburg, the novel it was based was written as a prequel to Gettysburg’s source Killer Angels. The author Jeff Shaara, was following the success of his father’s historical novel in that he takes a few important officers on each side of a conflict and then tries to get into their minds. Unlike Killer Angels, which focuses only on a few days in 1863, Gods and Generals covers entire Civil War up to the death of Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson in May 1863. Naturally, one may imagine a screen adaptation would take the form of a mini-series (Jeff Shaara has said this), but Ron Maxwell, who had a bit hit with Gettysburg, seemed to think it would be fine as an actual theatrical release.

Between the large scope of history the film covers and some poor filmmaking choices, Gods and Generals was such an uneven slog that it became a big flop. Critical events and important figures have to be cut to make room, but at the same time Maxwell spends an inordinate amount of time on fluff, unnecessary side characters, and long speeches that worked in the more condensed timeline of Gettysburg, but kill the pacing here.

Americas 250th Birthday Cinemathon #20: Abe Lincoln in Illinois (1940)

 

Abraham Lincoln is one of the greatest figures in American history, no matter what your opinion of him is. He was an instrumental player in one of America’s great transition points. Abe Lincoln in Illinois is an adaptation of the play of the same name, which in turn was heavily derived from Carl Sandburg’s Prairie Years volume of his Lincoln biography. Thus it charts Lincoln’s life from the 1830s up until the 1860 election. Running at a little under two hours, it commits one of the common sins of biopics, which is trying to cover too much of a person’s life. Thus I was surprised to not only enjoy the film, but be legitimately invested in much of it, especially towards the end.

Raymond Massey was famous for playing Lincoln in the stage version, and he reprises his role here for an Academy Award nomination. Massey was well into his forties, so the earlier scenes seem a bit off. For example, we first see him being sent off by his mother to make something of himself in the world. Massey’s aged face makes the scene somewhat comical. As the film progresses, though, I do get more comfortable with him in the role, and his age definitely fits in the last act.

Massey’s Lincoln is a good-natured, self-deprecating county boy who wins the hearts of almost everyone around him. He goes from taking odd frontier jobs to becoming a lawyer. He’s also consistently reluctant to get involved with politics, first being pressured into becoming a local politician, then a congressman, and finally running for the presidency despite his self-doubts. While this does humanize him much more than some rather hagiographic depictions, I’m going to have to call foul on its accuracy. Lincoln may have had humble origins, but he definitely had an ambitious streak and I don’t think he needed everyone to keep prodding him towards his destiny. Because of time’s sake, the movie also skips over his railroad lawyer career. The railroad industry in 19^th Century America was notoriously corrupt, so it’s possible Lincoln had to get dirty despite his “Honest Abe” appellation.

Americas 250th Birthday Cinemathon #19: Harriet (2019)

 

One of the great heroines of 19^th Century history is Harriet Tubman, a Maryland slave who, after escaping to Pennsylvania, headed back south to rescue other African-Americans from bondage. Sadly, some of the awesome stories about her are likely the results of oft-fictionalized 19^th Century biographies, but she’s still a woman worth celebrating. Her story has been told on television, most notably in the 1978 miniseries A Woman Called Moses (I would have watched this one if I didn’t already have many 3-4 hour movies coming up). Surprisingly, it wasn’t until 2019 that we got a theatrical depiction in the simply titled Harriet.

The movie was actually considered back in the 90s, but shockingly a Hollywood executive, believing a black female lead couldn’t carry a movie, suggested that Tubman be played by Julia Roberts! Anyways, Cynthia Ervo would get the role when the movie finally swung into production. She does a good job, playing an initially frightened runaway slave before becoming a determined and tough heroine. Also, unlike in 12 Years a Slave, we get a good dose of the slaves’ Christianity. Tubman’s head was once struck and split open, whereupon she received visions. She claimed they were from God, and some sources claim that they indeed helped her successfully evade capture when guiding slaves to freedom. I was pleased to see that they had a scene of her threatening to shoot a runaway when he wants to go back to his master. This actually happened a few times in real life. Harriet knew that if a slave had second thoughts and went back, he could endanger the whole group.

Americas 250th Birthday Cinemathon #18: How the West Was Won (1962)

 

How the West Was Won is an epic multi-generational western filmed in the rarely used Cinerama. Cinerama was even wider than widescreen, and required a special set-up to show. While this made for a grand viewing in theaters, the image is so stretched that no TV can show the full images without black screens. On the blue-ray I watched almost half the screen was the black bars on the top and bottom.

The original plan, believe it or not, was even more epic, with six segments and more historical characters coming in and out. The final product was only five segments and only the middle has any real historical figures, but was still grand with wonderful cinematography and a slew of major stars and character actors, not to mention three directors dividing the segments (John Ford among them). The casting is mostly great, the problem being a couple actors who are too old for their role. The worst case is James Stewart, a middle-aged man playing someone who’s supposed to be young. They didn’t even bother dyeing his hair! The segments themselves are not terribly original in their storylines, but do have aspects that make them somewhat fresh, whether it be original stunts or, in the case of “The Plains”, switching out the usual squeaky clean heroes for a gambler and a showgirl.

There’s not a central plot, but the movie does follow a family through 50 years of western history. There are two characters that can be said to have leading roles. Debbie Reynolds is the one who goes coast-to-coast, starting as one of the two daughters of the Prescott family (Lilith Prescott) and becoming a cool old lady at the end. I’d say she’s my favorite. George Peppard doesn’t appear until “The Civil War”, but becomes the male action lead for the rest of the movie, being a soldier and then a lawman. Linking all the segments together is the narrating voice of Spencer Tracy.

Americas 250th Birthday Cinemathon #17: Jeremiah Johnson (1972)

Jeremiah Johnson is, quite simply, a movie about Jeremiah Johnson, one of the most legendary mountain men of the old American West. Going west to tough it out in the gold and fur trades, he somehow got into a blood feud with the Crow. He earned the nickname “liver-eating Johnson,” based on the rumor that he would cut out the liver of each Crow warrior he killed. The movie doesn’t include the liver part, so don’t worry about any violence in that respect.

Jeremiah Johnson is based on two books, the non-fiction Crow Killer: The Saga of Liver-Eating Johnson and Vardis Fisher’s historical novel Mountain Man, with a few inventions of its own. The real Jeremiah Johnson’s life is sketchy in areas, with gaps often filled by possibly legendary inventions and embellished facts. The movie definitely adjusts his beginnings. He’s simply portrayed as a Mexican War veteran, when in real life he actually deserted and changed part of his name. The movie likely does this to make him start out as a more innocent and out-of-his-depth man.

Americas 250th Birthday Cinemathon #16: 12 Years a Slave

 

12 Years a Slave, directed by Steve McQueen, is one of the more in-depth looks at what it was like to be a slave. It’s based on the memoir of Solomon Northup, a free black living in New York who was attracted by a fiddling job in Washington DC, only to be drugged and wake up in a slave pen. He found himself transported along with other kidnapped blacks (and a lot of slaves who were also abducted or were being resold) to New Orleans. For the next 12 years (1841-1853) he served under several masters, experiencing different degrees of slavery. Eventually he found a sympathetic white Canadian, Samuel Bass, who got word of where he was to his family, and Northup was freed. Understandably, he became a prominent abolitionist.

There is actually a debate about the veracity of Northup’s memoir. The debate arises form several passages which seem to express white views of slavery and race and others which had uncanny similarities to other slave narratives. The explanation for these bits is that Northup wrote his memoir via dictation through a white writer. The white writer likely decided to make some alterations to make the book more sellable.

Americas 250th Birthday Cinemathon #15: Amistad (1997)

 Steven Spielberg finally makes it to my watchlist with Amistad. Amistad is one of his less known movies and thus also his most underrated. It’s a high-stakes court drama, based on the story of the Spanish slaver Amistad. As in real life, the slaves on board manage to slaughter most of the crew. The two surviving Spaniards, however, don’t take them back to Africa, but land in Connecticut. With the slave trade legal for Spain, but not America, there is a long legal battle. President Martin van Buren, seeking reelection, is worried that if the slaves are freed he’ll lose the southern vote, so he twice has the trial done again in a higher court. He also has to deal with the Spanish government, which insists that the slaves are their property and should be punished for killing most of the slavers.

The movie is chockfull of real historical characters and follows the events closely for the most part. The main character is Cinque (Djimon Hounsou), a man kidnapped and sold into slavery. The real Cinque actually had a different name that was anglicized into his more familiar one, but the movie simplifies things. His defense lawyer is Roger Sherman Baldwin (Matthew McConaughey), who was a well established legal figure in real life, but is turned into an ambitious low-level one to give us more of an underdog story. The big hurdle for the defense team is the language barrier, but gradually this is overcome with the discovery of James Covey (Chiwetel Ejiofor), a sailor who was born in West Africa and knows some of the different tongues.

Americas 250th Birthday Cinemathon #14: The Alamo (2004)

 

Among the more filmed moments of American history is the Battle of the Alamo. To those who don’t know the story, Mexico, trying to popular their largely unsettled northern territories, invited Americans to depart the United States and come to Texas. Naturally, letting thousands of Protestants, many with their own unique beliefs of what a society should be, flood into a Catholic held land caused many social problems. I can’t claim to understand the dizzying Mexican political scene of the 19^th Century, which was constantly shifting and saw frequent revolts and revolutions. However, the United States best remembers the Texas Revolution of 1836, which featured the legendary last stand of under 200 men at the Alamo in San Antonio. With no option for surrender, they fought to the last man and inflicted over thrice their number in Mexican casualties.

If I include Disney’s Davy Crockett series, I’ve seen only three of the Alamo adaptations. I considered trying a new one, but decided to rewatch the last of them, the 2004 effort directed by John Lee Hancock and produced by one of Disney’s many production companies. The movie was a big bomb. While I can see how it might not connect with audiences, I think the cause was the historical debate about the event that was happening. There was some revision going on, some of it well-researched and credible. I remember people in right-wing media and in my social circles thinking the movie was going to be a left-wing retelling that would paint the Alamo defenders in a negative light or worse vilify them. Actually, while the movie gets rid of some of the admittedly ludicrous glorification (I’ll discuss a couple aspects of this) it still paints the Texan Revolution in a fairly positive light. In fact it removes a couple facts that would undercut the heroism. On the other hand, production issues led many people to decide it was a bad movie before it even came out, so that didn't help.