A Man By Any Other Name
John Morgan (Richard Harris), a wealthy aristocrat from England, enjoys hunting. He decides to take a trip to America to hunt to get away from England for a while and hunt some new game. While bathing in a nearby stream after an outing, a group of Indians silently infiltrate his camp and kill his hunter and guide friends. Morgan is taken captive like a stolen horse (lead by a rope around his neck) and brought back to the tribe’s village. There he is given to the elderly mother of Chief Yellow Hand to be her work horse, essentially. He is kept outside with the dogs and treated as such. Morgan is unable to communicate with the Indians due to a language barrier but, over time, slowly begins to earn their respect and learn their way of life. He meets Batise (Gascon), who acts as his interpreter. Batise was captured some five years previously and Morgan decides they will work together to find a way to escape the Indian village. The only way to do this, it seems, is if Morgan marries Running Deer (Corinna Tsopei), the sister of Yellow Hand, and uses her to organize a war party to battle the Shoshone.
Of course, marrying her is not an option for a long time. Morgan suffers through a year of hard labor and less than optimal treatment as he slowly carves out a life in the village. Eventually it is made known that he wants to marry Running Deer, who has an attraction for him as well. Before he’s allowed to, he must pass the tests of courage, which include the vow to the sun ritual. This arduous trial is a key part of the film, but Morgan manages to survive and earns not only the respect of the tribesmen elders, but also the hand of Running Deer.
Morgan evolves yet again when he realizes that he is happy in the tribe and with Running Deer, and his thoughts of “escaping” from the tribe seem less sure. The situation becomes further difficult when a rival tribe raids the village.
This is a pretty powerful drama that plays on several familiar themes such as the power of the human spirit and of love. The film also provides an interesting cultural study of sorts into this particular Sioux tribe’s way of life. I found the story and its execution to be sound. Some scenes were shrouded in suspense which I thought worked to the film’s benefit. It is one of those movies, though, that just doesn’t warrant a lot of repeated viewings. In other words, A Man Called Horse is well worth watching, but I don’t see myself watching it again anytime soon, if ever. The drama and pacing of the movie are such that it just doesn’t make for an easy movie to watch time and again, which could determine if this one is a rental or purchase for some consumers.
Trotting Onto Blu-ray
Paramount is releasing several western films on Blu-ray on the 31st and from what I can tell, they’re all receiving similar treatment. That treatment isn’t stellar, unfortunately. Expect mostly good image quality — most scenes are impressive with bright, vibrant color and crisp quality. But, there are several minutes worth of scenes that are of a far lower quality and it’s jarring to go from very good to poor image quality. For sound, the DTS-HD 5.1 does very well, and mono tracks and subtitles are offered for a variety of other languages that you will likely never use.
Just like with Big Jake and Rio Lobo, two other western BD releases from Paramount next week, there are no extra features on this release at all. Too bad for what is a highly rated movie on IMDB and one whose sequel is also well received.
To the summary…
