Natíve Amerícans: The Surprísing Sílents

Author(s): Angela Aleiss

Source: Cinéaste , 1995, Vol. 21, No. 3 (1995), pp. 34-35
Published by: Cineaste Publishers, Inc.

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/41687384

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 of racism in American filmmaking are
Some of the racism subjectofpast,
the subject in present
the three of American the , three and filmmaking future contributions aspects are
contributions Natfoe Ameßicans:
to this installment of our continuing series

The SuHpRÍsíng Sí Lents

on Race in Contemporary American Cine-
ma. In "The Surprising Silents," Angela
Aleiss indicates that many contemporary
" reforms " involving Native Americans ( the by Angela Aleiss
use of Native Americans to play themselves ,
the employment of Native Americans
behind the cameray and the fashioning of
positive images and storylines) were not
uncommon in the silent era. Her survey
raises the issue why the cinematic image of
Native Americans deteriorated and suggests
the long-term impact of present reforms
may also prove fleeting. Rosa Linda Fregoso,
author of the landmark The Bronze
Screen: Chicana and Chicano Film Cul-
ture, takes on the gender and ethnic prob-
lematics involved when a genuinely " break-
through " treatment of an ethnic issue is
attempted by someone outside of the group.
And Jesse Rhines , a Cineaste Assistant Edi-
tor , looks at the economic underpinnings of
the minicycles of African-American film-
making in Hollywood. He also indicates
where the present and future economic win-
dows of opportunity might lie.

announce that they have 'reinvented'

Evçry the announce NativeAmerican
the Native decade,genre.
thatFinally,
American they Hollywood have genre. 'reinvented' studios Finally,
studios say, Indians will be portrayed as
accurately as possible; they will now play
Members of the Ojibwa tribe were featured in Henry Carter's The Silent Enemy (1930).
themselves in major roles and their non- (Photo courtesy of Museum of Modern Art)
Indian antagonists will be seen in a less than
positive light. In short, the old saying that White Fawn's Devotion (1910) is a goodan wife suddenly appears. She announces
the only good Hollywood Indian is a dead example of an early Western without thethat the wound was not mortal after all, and
Indian will no longer be valid. clichés of hostile Indian warriors or wagonthe family is happily reunited.
This line of reasoning contains several train attacks. The film is directed by James The controversial D.W. Griffith has been
faulty assumptions. During the silent era, Young Deer (Winnebago), a Native Ameri-rightly criticized for his savage Sioux war-
the many 'reforms' so grandly proclaimed can producer/director who headed up theriors in The Battle at Elderbush Gulch (1914)
by contemporary filmmakers were com- Pathé Frères' West Coast studio in Los and the intoxicated Mohawk Indians in
monplace. Unfortunately, these silent Indi- Angeles. It is the story of an Indian woman America (1924). Less known, however, is
an-theme films failed to change dominant and a white man who are married and live Griffith's The Redman and the Child (1908),
cultural values, and they cquld not with- with their young daughter in the Dakotas. his first Western and arguably his best. A
stand the demand for the cowboy-and- Indi- One day, the husband receives a letterwhite boy and his Indian companion form
an attacks by the late 1930s in Westerns like informing him of an inheritance back East, an enduring friendship when the warrior
The Plainsman (1937), Texas Rangers and he packs his bags. His distraught wife, saves the child from marauding outlaws and
(1937), and Stagecoach (1939). While nu- who believes he will never return, grabs aavenges the murder of the boy's grandfather.
merous books have already discussed these knife and stabs herself. The Indian hero proudly paddles his canoe
silent films, many have not been readily Up to this point, the plot resembles back to the campsite with the exhausted
available to scholars, much less the general Edwin Milton Royle's popular stage play, child asleep by his side. In a similar manner,
public. Now that situation has dramatically The Squaw Man (1905), upon which Cecil Griffith's The Broken Doll (1910) features
changed. The Motion Picture, Broadcasting B. De Mille based three films. But where
the sacrifice of an Indian girl, but Was He a
and Recorded Sound Division of the Library Royle and De Mille presented a tragic end- Coward? ( 1911) deals with a white man who
of Congress has recently identified more ing to an Indian/white marriage, White cares for an Indian stricken with smallpox.
than two hundred fiction and nonfiction Fawn's Devotion offers a happier outcome. The man nurses the sick Indian back to
films with substantial Native American con- The daughter has seen her father pick up the health, and the final scene shows the white
tent.* This treasure trove allows us to knife, so she assumes he's murdered her man's face bearing the fatal pock marks.
mother. She then informs the Indian tribe,
rethink that early era and to speculate realis- More ambiguous treatments are found in
tically on what later brought about more which takes the man captive. As the poor Griffith's A Romance of the Western Hills
negative Indián images. man's head is about to be severed, his Indi- (1910) and The Chiefs Daughter (1911). In

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both films, a white man seduces an Indian as she parades about town in elegant cloth-
woman and cruelly casts her aside. The men ing. The Paleface (1921), written and direct-
are callous in their behavior and their dis- ed by Buster Keaton and Edward Cline and
honesty immediately offends their white starring the comic genius himself, pokes fun
fiancées. When the white women learn of at traditional cowboy-and-Indian Westerns
their lovers' unfaithfulness, they break off by depicting Keaton as the Indians' hero.
their own relationships. Max Fleischer's cartoon, Big Chief Koko
One of Griffith's contemporaries, (1925), predated Who Killed Roger Rabbit ?
Thomas H. Ince, was celebrated for his by decades when he mixed real life and ani-
treatment of Native Americans. In 1911, mated characters.
Ince and a troupe of cowboy riders and gun- Among the more sympathetic and cul-
slingers from Miller Brothers 101 Ranch turally sensitive films that capped this era
Real Wild West Show camped along the was The Silent Enemy (1930), a feature about
foothills of the Santa Monica Mountains, the Indians' struggle against hunger. The
just northwest of Los Angeles. This scenic movie re-created Ojibwa lifestyle with
oceanfront site, commonly referred to as painstaking detail: the carving of a birch-
"Inceville," was dotted with tipis belonging bark canoe, the hunting of a partridge, and
to the Oglala Sioux Indians from Pine the sounding of a wooden instrument to
Ridge, South Dakota. Ince was responsible lure a hidden elk. Chauncy Yellow Robe
for the Indians' care, and he agreed to pro- (Sioux) introduced the silent film with a
vide them with the required hours of brief talking prologue, and many of the
schooling each day. "The Indians appeared film's artifacts were borrowed from the
in many of my two-reel pictures," Ince American Museum of Natural History.
wrote in his memoirs, "and did some truly Director Henry P. Carver filmed on location
remarkably [sic] work." in Northern Ontario and cast members of
Richard Dix and Lois Wilson in George B.
Custer's Last Fight (1912; reissued in Seitz's The Vanishing American (1925). the Ojibwa tribe to portray Indian lifestyle
1925) was produced by Thomas Ince and(Photo courtesy of Museum of Modern Art) before Columbus arrived.
shows the events leading to the historic Bat- Silent movies, in fact, often incorporated
tle of the Little Bighorn. The cast includescareer in Hollywood spanned more than authentic artifacts in many of their Indian-
Francis Ford (director John Ford's brother)fifty years) exposed civilization's corruptingtheme productions. Edward Curtis's In the
and William Eagleshirt (Oglala), one of Hol-influence upon Alaskan Native life in FrozenLand of the Head-Hunters (1914) and John
lywood's first Indian actors. Introduced as Justice (1929). An attractive half- white, half- Maple's Before the White Man Came (1920)
the "actual reproduction of, and the inci-Inuit girl is torn between life with her were two early films that boasted of cultural
dents that led up to the reddest chapter inAlaskan Native husband and the bustling accuracy by using Indians in major roles and
the Indian wars of the Western Plains," excitement in the nearest town. An un- recreating traditional Native American (and
Custer's Last Fight takes a decidedly patriotic scrupulous white trader mistreats andCanadian) ex- lifestyle. Prominent American
view, of the Army officer's involvement in ploits the woman, who dies tragically inIndians her who played significant roles in the
the controversial battle. The Sioux Indians husband's arms. silent era included Lillian St. Cyr (Winneba-
are enemies who "bitterly opposed the ad- On the other hand, The Heart of Wetona go), known in Hollywood as 'Princess Red-
vance of the white man and civilization," (1919) concluded with the Blackfoot Indian wing' and star of The Squaw Man (1914),
woman happily married to a white man. and Chief Yowlache (Yakima), featured in
and the daring Custer is "one of the best In-
dian fighters the Army has ever produced." Director Sidney A. Franklin (whose impres- With Sitting Bull at the ' Spirit Lake Massacre '
But Ince would not neglect the Indians'sive credits would later include some of (1927).
side of American history. His more sympa- Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's most stylish epics) The cultural assumptions evident in
thetic portrayals include The Indian Mas- these silent films raise a number of issues.
offered another variation of the 'squaw man'
sacre (1912; also known as The Heart of antheme when Wetona chooses a life with her Given that Native American actors and
Indian) y which shows how white frontiers-white lover, rather than remaining with her directors, authentic artifacts, and sympa-
men slaughtered the buffalo and shot at theown tribe. Norma Talmadge, the silent thetic images were integral to silent films,
Indians for mere sport. Angry Indians retali- screen heroine, portrayed the title role. why did this pattern not continue? Are the
ate and kidnap a white child as a replace- Occasionally, an oddity appeared with no assumptions in so-called revisionist films
ment for their own lost one. The final shot Indian or white heroes. Dead Man s Claim like Dances With Wolves mainly illusionary
of an Indian mother grieving over her (1912) featured the screen's first cowboy by simply being refined versions of the old
child's death powerfully illustrates the star, 'Broncho Billy' Anderson, and its pes- noble savage concept? What finally deter-
maternal bond. simistic look at humanity foreshadows Erichmines cultural authenticity and historical
Ince was not alone in exposing the evils von Stroheim's 1923 classic, Greed. Two accuracy? The rich diversity and innovative
of civilization. 'Serial king' George B. Seitz cowboy friends embark upon a search for a theme of these films held by the Library of
directed The Vanishing American (1925), agold mine, but while Broncho Billy is asleep, Congress may provide some practical guid-
sweeping epic of mismanagement and cor- the friend steals his water and supplies. Aance to the further exploration of these sen-
ruption on modern-day reservations. Based scraggly Indian watches this treachery and sitive issues. ■
upon a Zane Grey story and starring pilfers the water for himself. Both cowboy
Richard Dix, The Vanishing American tar- and Indian die of thirst, and, in a startling
* All films may be vie
gets inept government agents as the real cul- move, Broncho Billy shoots himself.
gress by researchers wit
prits who lie, cheat, and torment just about On a more cheerful note is the Library's guide to the films, Am
every Indian. So powerful was the movie'scollection of Indian-theme comedies. Rari- Motion Pictures in the Lib
indictment that silent film historian Kevin ties like Biograph's A Midnight PhantasyKaren C. Lund, is free o
Brownlow has concluded, "The problem of(1903) satirize Victorian morality when aLibrarian, Motion Pictur
the Indian and his betrayal by the govern-jealous warrior presents a ballerina with theSound Division, Librar
D.C. 20540. Also availab
ment was more clearly etched in this picturebloody scalp of her pompous suitor. An Up-on some 150 contempor
than in any other silent film." to-Date Squaw (1911), another farcical
Indians on Film and Video : Documentaries in the
Acclaimed director Allan Dwan (whose story, follows the adventures of a chief s wife
Library of Congress , compiled by Jennifer Brathovde.

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