Haven't seen this film before but I was surprised at how 'stupid' they made the Indians, whooping and hollering and just letting Mitchum pick them off one by one with the rifle.
Then when the two Indians got to the raft the only thing the one Indian could think to do was start trying to rip MM clothes off. That didn't make a whole hell of a lot of sense.
lmao I kno ..when that one indian started attacking MM I was like wtf? lol that was just a way to make them look unintelligent and barbaric.
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Yup, pretty dumb. Guess that's why they lost the 'war' & the country, huh?
Really though, it's just 1950's Western hokum, designed to add suspense. Realistically, why would they bother attacking people on a raft, especially since the Indians didn't have guns? In that scene, I figure they lose 7 men - to what purpose?
And just as dopey was the idea that Big Bob could hold off the Indians back at the farm, if only he had his rifle. Oh? For how long? Until he ran out of ammunition? Or food and water? Or until an Indian or two showed up with their own rifles? Silliness. It's a concept that you'd swear the NRA had come up with.
The notion wasn't that he could "hold them off, if only he had his rifle". The idea was that if he was to go down, it would be fighting rather than on his knees. Remember he said something to the effect of, "It's our land, we cleared it, we settled it, and we'll remain on it- or under it."
share"He who fights and runs away, lives to fight another day".
And that's overlooking the obvious point that it wasn't really his land to start with; it was the Indian's. That why they objected so strongly to the whites taking the land. Just like you and I would if a bunch of strangers were to end up in our back 40, declare it their own, then procede to try and either kill us or force us off the place.
I'm hardly a liberal apologist, but if you read up on it, you'll find that the government screwed the Indian's at practically every step. Nothing but a series of broken promises and treaties.
Like Chief Dan George said: "The white man came to our land with the Bible in his hand. Now we've got the Bible and he's got the land".
I've got some native blood in my veins, and know my history well. I won't explain my personal opinions about the matter you've brought up, but I will say that it is irrelevant within the context of the movie. The lead character believed it was his land- and that's all that it takes for him to defend it. Being a crack shot with a longarm, he thought he could defend it effectively with his rifle. That's it. This movie is not a documentary, and not based on truth. The Indians were merely a plot device to get the people on the raft, and a filler for the scenes between the farm and the city.
He who fights and runs away from his home lives to fight homeless. There has got to be a time to make a stand, and I can think of few better times than defending your family, or something you have worked hard to obtain.
Teddy-996 said: "There has got to be a time to make a stand, and I can think of few better times than defending your family, or something you have worked hard to obtain"
Nice.
And I guess we can assume your policy goes for the Indians, too? And you would have been just as happy to see the Indians blow Robert Mitchum's head off and regain the land stolen from them and from their families?
I sure would have, if it was well written.
Perhaps you misunderstood my above post, RealScience. This is a movie, and for this movie's plot, all that counts is that the main character considers it to be his land. That's all it takes for him to defend it.
The bit you quoted- do you disagree with the content, or the context of the quote?
It was no more "the Indians" than it was any other group of people's, They too came from another land and settled there before the "White man", INDEED... by your way of thinking then the so called Indians must have taken it from the woolly mammoths, who took it from the dinosaurs.. lol!
cheerio!
Like a finger pointing to the moon don't focus on the finger or you'll miss all the heavenly glory!
More than likely they took it from another Native American tribe. Here in Arizona the land claimed by the Navajos and the Apache were taken by them from other tribes they either drove out like the Pimas or exterminated. Also, they fought each other long before the Spanish or the Americans came, and never united against either. In fact, in 1862 the Apaches helped Kit Carson against the Navajos. Twenty years later the Navajos returned the favor and helped General Crook fight the Apache. Alliances between Native American tribes could be effective, as at the Little Big Horn, but they never lasted long.
shareYeah, and here in Canada the land was passed over to the Canadians from the British who took it from the French who took it from the Indians. Alliances between European countries weren't that strong either. The Europeans fought against each other for centuries and killed millions of their own kind in the two great wars. I guess that justifies stealing their land, huh?
Since the Indians did the same thing, yes. As ye rip off, so shall ye be ripped! The Asians, Africans, and Native South Americans were all guilty of it. If you want to hold the land so badly, fight harder.
shareRe: "And that's overlooking the obvious point that it wasn't really his land to start with; it was the Indian's. That why they objected so strongly to the whites taking the land."
What? So a white father and son couldn't make a cabin and live by the river? Even today, the American West is a vast wilderness and pockets of population are few and far between, how much more so back then? The Natives rarely settled, but generally traveled from place to place as hunters and gatherers. So what part of the West was the Natives and what part was up for settling? Not every inch of the West was the Natives.
My point? There's no excuse for the Indians to not allow the white dude and his son to live on a cabin by the river in a wilderness so vast that you could travel for hundreds of miles without seeing another human being. I know it's just a 50's movie and not reality, but -- in the world of this movie -- the Natives were definitely the "bad guys," not the whites, except of course for the gambler and one of the hunters.
I agree, however, that the Indians got screwed by the US Government, just like we are today.
No this is "white man" stupid. I'd take John Wayne's Indians over the dumba$$ portrayal in this movie. Let's face it -- back in the '50s there was so much unintelligent inaccurate portrayals of natives, they are painful to watch in today's context. They were simply a dumb plot mechanism so that we would focus on the trio on the raft and not think of the other characters in anything but a single dimension.
shareBut weren't Injun braves warriors who wouldn't just run off at the first sign of trouble?
I'm not sure when this film is set but I assume it's the 1870s or 1880s. When did the Injun problem finally settle down and the attacks on settlers cease?
Maybe the stupidness of movie-Indians got fuel from some real-life Indians customs, like "counting coup":
"The most prestigious acts included touching an enemy warrior with the hand, bow, or with a coup stick then escaping unharmed"
Although Hollywood have never needed any reasons to make some groups seem stupid.
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<<Then when the two Indians got to the raft the only thing the one Indian could think to do was start trying to rip MM clothes off. That didn't make a whole hell of a lot of sense.>>
The Hell it didn't!
This was one of the most annoying things about the film. The Indians could not shoot an arrow to target. They threw themselves in the way of bullets - the scene where they were hurling the rocks. They swam to a raft just as it was about to hit rapid, therefore, drowning.
In fact all the antagonists in the film were stupid including Harry.
I give my respect to those who have earned it; to everyone else, I'm civil.share