DANCES WITH WOLVES. Directed by Kevin Costner; written by Michael Blake; produced by Jim Wilson and Kevin Costner. Starring Kevin Costner, Mary McDonnell and Graham Greene. Rated PG-13.
More reviews by —
TITLE:
RATING:
It's such a pleasant surprise when a movie lives up to the high expectations you have of it. The longer in advance one hears about a movie, it seems, and the more one anticipates it, the more likely it is to bomb. Happily, Dances with Wolves, far from bombing, fulfills and perhaps even exceeds the hype which preceded its release.
For a movie some might consider excessive in length, it indulges in very few unpleasant excesses. (Most of the excess comes near the end, anyway, when we're set up for it and don't mind quite so much.)
So it's not a perfect movie, but it comes pretty darn close. Adventure, humor, beauty and pathos combine in almost always just the right amounts to result in a very satisfying picture.
The story follows Civil War soldier Dunbar (Costner) from a suicide attempt that backfires into heroism to his reassignment out west.
The post he's dispatched to is abandoned, but since solitude and sightseeing were what he was after anyway, he's content to settle in and await his relief.
He eventually makes friends with a nearby village of Sioux. They become more than friends when he falls in love and slowly discovers a spiritual kinship with the nomads and their simple yet profoundly satisfying existence.
One of the most noticeable things about Dances with Wolves is it's sheer originality. Most importantly, we've had a few movies through the years that have looked at the white man/Indian conflicts of the late 1880's from the red man's perspective. But none have personalized the conflict to quite this degree, and none have so completely turned the tables on most of the old western movie cliches.
The details of white and Sioux existence are painstakingly correct. The costumes are authentic down to the deerskins and porcupine quill ornamentation. And, for the most original touch in the movie, the Sioux language, Lakota, is used by the Indians and eventually by Dunbar, too. The Lakota dialogue is subtitled, but rather than a distraction from the story, it's an enhancement to its realism.
The violence in Dances with Wolves is graphic and might upset sensitive viewers, but it's not gratuitous—it was a violent period in our history, after all. And no matter how interesting the movie, some kids would find it impossible to sit still for 3+ hours.
With these cautions in mind, though, it would be an excellent movie for youngsters to see. Especially since they might not understand just how good a western movie can be.
December 5, 1990