Despite of what many people think, this is the Native American’s territory, therefore we are just invading their territory. Hollywood has made many representations about Indians that most of the time have the same content of barbarian Native Americans killing the good white people that came to America to civilize them. How good does that sound? The truth is the way it sounds is not actually the way it happened, and Hollywood has influenced in what we think about natives.
Native cultural identity has been shaped and used by Hollywood for their own profit. It is certainly true that a movie sells more when a white “saves the day” against American natives than a different situation in favor of Native Americans.
It is clear that Hollywood has …show more content…
The first period was the silent film, in which the Indians were shown as native nobles, The second period was the stage westerns in which Native Americans appeared as wild, and finally,. The third period is the present in which the Indians are portrayed as wonderful individuals of profound wisdom, very mystical.
The first time the Indians were filmed was in 1894, when Thomas Alva Edison recorded the natives show Wild West Buffalo Bill, a kind of very popular show (typical west show) the images caused great excitement. Just four years earlier the slaughter of Wounded Knee took place, where the regiment of the 7th Cavalry opened fire on a camp Sioux killing ninety men and two hundred women and children, who had rendered previously, the excuse to kill them was that they did not want to surrender their weapons. The appearance of the film coincided with the latest massacres of Indians.
In the silent film the natives were very popular characters. They were the main characters in most of the movies. No wonder these films were about clashes between settlers and Indians, but sometimes, as in Kit Carson, 1903, the story was about an Indian who saves a settler kidnapped by Indians. Or in The Call of the Wild, 1908, where an Indian in love with a white saves when the hijack other Indians, but then she rejects her love and he is riding sad and
Native cultural identity has been shaped and used by Hollywood for their own profit. It is certainly true that a movie sells more when a white “saves the day” against American natives than a different situation in favor of Native Americans.
It is clear that Hollywood has …show more content…
The first period was the silent film, in which the Indians were shown as native nobles, The second period was the stage westerns in which Native Americans appeared as wild, and finally,. The third period is the present in which the Indians are portrayed as wonderful individuals of profound wisdom, very mystical.
The first time the Indians were filmed was in 1894, when Thomas Alva Edison recorded the natives show Wild West Buffalo Bill, a kind of very popular show (typical west show) the images caused great excitement. Just four years earlier the slaughter of Wounded Knee took place, where the regiment of the 7th Cavalry opened fire on a camp Sioux killing ninety men and two hundred women and children, who had rendered previously, the excuse to kill them was that they did not want to surrender their weapons. The appearance of the film coincided with the latest massacres of Indians.
In the silent film the natives were very popular characters. They were the main characters in most of the movies. No wonder these films were about clashes between settlers and Indians, but sometimes, as in Kit Carson, 1903, the story was about an Indian who saves a settler kidnapped by Indians. Or in The Call of the Wild, 1908, where an Indian in love with a white saves when the hijack other Indians, but then she rejects her love and he is riding sad and