Printing the Legend: Colonization by camera

April 25, 2023 Moviejawn Account

by Ryan Silberstein, Managing Editor, Red Herring

This column is going to be a bit different than usual because neither of the movies I am talking about today are westerns. However, because depictions of Native Americans are so endemic to the genre, this is a worthy diversion. The 2009 documentary Reel Injun, from directors Catherine Bainbridge, Neil Diamond (not that Neil Diamond), and Jeremiah Hayes confronts this head on, as their film tackles the history of Native American people on screen and the various ebbs and flows of that depiction over the first century of film.

Starting at the end of the 19th century, Native Americans have been part of the film industry from the beginning, when the nascent art form was just about letting people see images they couldn’t see in motion before. At the same time, the “closing of the frontier” and the cultural move by whites to push the very idea of Native Americans into a sort of mythological stasis were happening. Americans began to see Indigenous peoples as tragic figures, wrapping in all of our anxieties about industrial expansion, but of course, not feeling remorseful enough to do anything about it. It was easier to shunt them into the past, despite there being a significant population living in the present (as of the last census, 2-3 million Americans marked down that they had some form of Native identity).

Because of this cultural moment–the closing of the west and the start of movies–the history of the two are intertwined. Reel Injun takes a long view of the impact of these on the larger culture. Movies like Stagecoach and The Searchers may attempt to offer some nuance from the white point of view, but nonetheless have propagated harmful stereotypes over the decades. I’ve been trying to keep these issues in mind when writing these columns, but I probably could have been doing better. There is a lot of synecdoche in depictions of Native Americans in movies, from the classic “phhht” sound of an arrow striking nearby (lampooned in this documentary) to the headband and feathers standing in for any tribe, regardless of any reality.

Reducing all Native Americans to a singular entity is also one of the cardinal sins of American colonialism. Movies almost entirely take the hallmarks of a few tribes from the Plains as a stand-in for how all Native Americans dress, from buckskin to feathered headpieces. Hollywood largely abandons the reality of culture for a simplistic portrayal, both on the character level and on the larger level. The entire popular conception of these cultures is rooted in visual art, movies, and other forms of entertainment created by whites.

A few times over the course of Hollywood history, there have been moments where things have broken through. Specifically with characters in The Outlaw Josey Wales, Little Big Man, and Dances With Wolves, where although the overall thematic meaning of the Native Americans in the stories is still deeply hurtful and inaccurate, indigenous actors like Chief Dan George and Graham Greene were able to depict characters that at least broadened beyond the stereotypes. And this gave way to movies like Smoke Signals and others that had actual Native American input into the way they are depicted. While Reservation Dogs debuted after Reel Injun was complete, that is another example of allowing Native Americans to tell their own stories on screen. And more of it is necessary, because we are still at a place where a few voices are perceived to speak for all, when the range of perspectives within the broader community is vast. This remains perhaps only remedy for the past, even if untangling the reality from the icon feels impossible at this point.

Reel Injun is a great overview of all of these issues and several more I haven’t covered here, including problematic summer camps and the controversial or false heritage of some of the most well known people claiming Native American ancestry. For something that could have been dry and factual, there is a lot of emotion on display, making for a truly engaging and thoughtful experience.

One of the few surviving examples of the sort of docudrama from the silent era that was so impactful in shaping our conception of Native Americans over the last hundred years is The Daughter of Dawn from 1920. Filmed around the Wichita Mountains in Oklahoma, it is the only known surviving silent film with an entirely Native American cast. Featuring over 300 actors from the Comanche and Kiowa tribes, the scale of the production is one of its most impressive features. The restoration is currently available streaming from the Criterion Channel and the Blu-Ray from Oscilloscope has some excellent special features that add some context and background on the film.

While the story itself centers on an only somewhat engaging love triangle, the historical context and window it offers into the past are well worth the viewing experience. Screening it along with Reel Injun and the films recommended within, or with Blood Quantum as a way to dive into the perspective of Native Americans both in front of and behind the camera.