Buffalo Bill and the Indians, or Sitting Bull's History Lesson

The setting is the base camp for Buffalo Bill Cody's Wild West Show, where the blustering Indian fighter of legend is gearing up for his latest national tour. Apart from sharpshooter Annie Oakley (Geraldine Chaplin) and her great friend, the Sioux chieftain Sitting Bull (Frank Kaquitts), the show is populated by phonies and opportunists. Biggest phony of all is Cody (Paul Newman), whose fame has been based more on the penny-dreadful scribblings of Ned Buntline (Burt Lancaster) than on any real accomplishments; even his long blond tresses are fake. Altman and cowriter Alan Rudolph (working from a play by Arthur Kopit) thump their insights about the Establishment's feet of clay as if they were breaking-news bulletins instead of countercultural cliches. Only the occasional ineffably mysterious Altman zoom shot offers relief. --Richard T. Jameson

Robert Altman fans will recognize stock characters from his other films, but will be entertained (perhaps delighted) throughout.


what an awful transfer   November 1, 2002
Shawna Lanne (Redwood City, CA)
First of all, this is a very ugly disc. So ugly that you have to watch it on an older tube TV. There are awful distortions during big movements and some scenes look very low rez. It's not the quality of the source print that I'm talking about (which is okay), it's a really bad transfer to DVD. It's not anamorphic widescreen at all, it's letterbox. It says anamorphic here in the Amazon descriptions, but I don't think it makes this claim on the box. The too-short documentary about the making of Buffalo Bill actually looks FAR BETTER than the movie itself as far as crisp detail and the absence of compression artifacts.

Spoilers follow - Buffalo Bill has a great first half-hour and then wobbles all over the place. The movie looks like it's going to be a typical Altman Audio/Visual stew of show business, fire arms, and history. The Wild Bill show looks wonderful, the cinematography is great, the dialogue seems pretty good and the casting inspires some optimism. Then the Indians show up. Sitting Bull and William Halsey are portrayed as noble, mysterious and aloof. The movie spirals into a series of events where they confound the smarmy Bill Cody over and over. The last hour of the movie requires Newman to act more and more flustered by Sitting Bull until he has a really cringeworthy breakdown in front of the ghostly Chief.

Anyway, there's stuff for hardcore Altman fans (I'm one) to watch for. Newman is initially impressive in his role and then sputters. The pageants and attention to details that Altman excels at are well done. Ultimately the themes of showbiz and history wilt before the rambling blah of the noble savage.


One of Altman's most entertaining films!   April 6, 2002
Max Fulton (Portland Oregon)
I loved this movie! But I wasn't surprised. Only Altman could bring so much humor, so much introspection and so much humanity to the western genre. Feauturing all-around brilliant performances by Newman, Lancaster, Sampson, Chaplin, Grey and of course Frank Kaquitts as Sitting Bull! Technically, the film excells, especially Paul Lohmann's wonderful cinematography. If you are a fan of Altman's or if your looking for something a little smarter than your run-of-the mill western drama, Buffalo Bill And The Indians Or Sitting Bull's History Lesson is a must!!!


Oh Please...........   March 31, 2002
Archmaker (California)
I love Robert Altman, and I am a tremendous fan of his movies (See McCabe & Mrs. Miller, The Long Goodbye, Shortcuts, etc.). But no one hits it out of the ballpark everytime, and this effort, while having some worthwhile moments, is a dud.

I never thought an Altman movie would bore me, but this one was interminable. He makes the point about Buffalo Bill, and hence all showbiz and celebrity (and politics), being a fraud in the first 15 minutes. But this is a two hour plus movie, and the next hour and 45 minutes is a lot of improvised movement & wandering around that signifies nothing & conveys nothing new beyond that.

The good things about the picture are Paul Newman, Will Samson, the dignity of the man playing Sitting Bull,Burt Lancaster, and the wonderful recreation of the look of Buffalo Bill's show. ( My father saw his show as a child, and the excitement & wonder of it never left him). But there is a whole lot of watching Newman walking around & having muddled dialogue with this one and that one, all adding up to not much.

If you want to indulge your guilt over the sorry and dreadful treatment of Native Americans knock yourself out. Even this very real subject is handled poorly here as well, the worthwhile moments overwhelmed by too much extraneous nonsense. And, as one reviewer pointed out, the real Buffalo Bill was said to have treated the Native Americans with kindness & respect and they regarded him well.

When you are an intuitive and flexible and improvisational film-maker, as Altman is, it is inevitable that you won't bottle lightning everytime out. And Altman has had his misfires, as has Kubrick, Kurosawa, Fellini, Bergman and every other brilliant artist. This is one.


A metaphor for the peculiarities of US foreign policies   October 30, 2001
socrates17 (New Jersey/Tanelorn 2008/9)
Of course, it was intended as a comment on a domestic policy. And a profoundly embarrassing one at that. Same diff. Same mind-set. One of Altman's best films. (Before the post-Player downhill slide.) Newman is wonderful. Burt Lancaster is wonderful. The European imigrants are generally buffoonish, but the Native Americans are presented as real people and not hyper-noble spiritual beings. That would have been too easy. Geraldine Chaplin is as ethereally wonderful as always - and, speaking of Chaplin, why isn't Cria Cuervos on DVD? Are the people who run those companies THAT hopeless???