Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee
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Is it age appropriate?
About our ratings -
Is it any good?
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Common Sense says
Melancholy saga of twilight of the American Indian.
Why We Rated This
for Ages 14 and Up
The good stuff
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What to watch out for
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What Parents Need to Know
This review of Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee was written by Charles Cassady Jr.
Parents need to know that this production, based on the nonfiction book by Dee Brown, has two intense Indian-massacre scenes -- one at the Little Big Horn in which Indians do the massacring, the other the Wounded Knee battle in which Indians are largely victims. Women and children are shown perishing in killings and disease epidemics, and a schoolhouse environment (for Indian children) seems bleak and oppressive. The downbeat tale puts across a strong theme of mistrust of the U.S. government.
Families Can Talk About
- Families can talk about this depiction of Native Americans. How is it different than the old cowboys-vs-Indians shoot-'em-ups? What other impressions of Indians do you get from movies?
- Does watching this film make you feel any different about Washington D.C. and government policies today? What would you have done in President Grant's position?
More on Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee
What’s the Story?
Is It Any Good?
BURY MY HEART AT WOUNDED KNEE is a vividly textured, high-quality cable movie from Law & Order creator Dick Wolf. There is resemblance between this Old West and that moody police-procedural where tense court hearings and suspect Q&As outnumber car chases. Here a dispiriting rundown of betrayal and broken treaties by Washington, D.C., turns into comprehensible drama, and if the results aren't action-packed, the thoughtful approach should still haunt older kids, especially those with the school-reading assignment When the Legends Die.
The most striking aspect, besides historical portraits of such prominent natives as Eastman, Sitting Bull, and Red Cloud, is how most whites aren't simplistic baddies, the usual revisionist-Western take. Instead Dawes and others actually believe they're doing the Indians a great favor by "civilizing" the tribes and behaving righteously in forcing the Lakota off their land and crushing their culture.
Movie Details
Run time: 132 minutes
Theatrical release: 5/27/2007, DVD release: 9/11/2007
MPAA Rating: NR

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