Geronimo: An American Legend

This criminally-underrated film is arguably the best Western since the 1970's. Geronimo: An American Legend (1993) is a truly astounding film, enjoyable as a thoughtful take on America's conquest of the American Indians and an old-fashioned, action-packed Western.

Apache holdout Geronimo (Wes Studi) reluctantly surrenders to General George Crook (Gene Hackman), who promises the Apache will be fairly treated on a reservation. However, things go awry when the government tries to suppress a subversive medicine man, leading to a new outbreak of violence. Despite Crook's efforts to maintain the peace, Geronimo goes on the war path with a small band, wreaking havoc across the Southwest and fleeing into Mexico. Crook is sacked, and his replacement, Nelson Miles (Kevin Tighe), commissions Lt. Gatewood (Jason Patric), a friend of Geronimo, shavetail Lt. Davis (Matt Damon) and grizzled scout Al Sieber (Robert Duvall) to go into Mexico and bring Geronimo in peaceably.

A collaboration between old-school filmmakers Walter Hill (The Long Riders) and John Milius (The Wind and the Lion), Geronimo is a wonderful film. It has a heavy revisionist agenda to sell, but remains essentially honest: Indian Removal is a crime, but it's not quite as simple as good whites versus noble Indians. Without the heavy-handed preaching of Little Big Man or Dances With Wolves, it shows the Indian Wars as an ugly business on both sides.

Most revisionist Westerns go overboard in "correcting" previous portrayals of the Indian Wars, but Geronimo is admirably even-handed, helped by its complex characterizations. Gatewood and Crook are decent men who genuinely believe in helping the Apache, and each reacts to Geronimo's intransigence according to his character: the idealist Gatewood grows disgusted with government policy, while career-soldier Crook blames Geronimo for breaking his word. Geronimo himself is a bit too noble compared to the historical figure, but the film doesn't gloss over his grisly crimes against white civilians. Compared to the Nazi-like cavalry and noble Indians of other revisionist films (see Soldier Blue), Geronimo has the ring of authenticity.

This balanced portrayal of complex events makes the ending all the more powerful. The most shocking scene occurs late in the film, when the Army arrests its heretofore loyal Apache scouts, sentencing them to the same confinement as Geronimo. This ugly sequence lays bare the hypocrisy and nastiness of Indian Removal: whatever the efforts of well-intentioned whites, their efforts were in service of an immoral cause. Regardless of attitude, tribe, religion or loyalty to the government, Indians are Indians, and now that the government has won they no longer count.

Hill and Milius are fine craftsmen, and Geronimo is certainly one heck of a film, politics aside. The movie has the look and feel of a Ford or Peckinpah Western, with lots of brilliantly staged shootouts and battle scenes (remarkably graphic for a PG-13 film). Its Utah locations are eerily beautiful, and the film has an engrossing, epic scope and feel. Arguably the best sequence, however, is an almost tangental bit where our protagonists square off against a gang of scummy scalphunters. Ry Cooder's synth-heavy score is hit-and-miss, effective at some points, at others sounding like a video-game soundtrack.

The cast is exquisite. Wes Studi (Avatar) is a compelling Geronimo, proud, reckless and defiant. Jason Patric (In the Valley of Elah) and a very young Matt Damon shine as conflicted. Old pros Gene Hackman and Robert Duvall get choice supporting roles. Smaller parts are farmed out to top-notch character talent: Rodney A. Grant (Dances With Wolves), Kevin Tighe (Eight Men Out), John Finn (Glory) and Stephen McHattie (A History of Violence).

I really don't understand how Geronimo: An American Legend is not better-known or acclaimed. Aside from Devil's Doorway, it may be the best film Hollywood has ever made about Native Americans.