His Mind is Clear

I can't quite understand how there can be so many unknown Altman films. He's an acknowledged master, but who has heard of Buffalo Bill and the Indians (1976)?

It starts in the Wild West (and stays there). Savage Indians are attacking a lone woman in a cabin. But as the camera draws back, we see that it is only a rehearsal for the Indian attack in the Buffalo Bill's show, with Joel Grey as the producer/director. Maybe they should set the cabin on fire?

Altman does his usual thing for a while, letting his camera roam and rest on a few random subjects - the old veteran telling tall tales of Indian slaughter to a band of Indian kids, some wranglers, Ned Buntline (Burt Reynolds), the author of the penny-dreadful novels of the old West that made Buffalo Bill famous. We hear many stories about who "discovered" Cody and made him famous, in fact. And finally, Buffalo Bill Cody himself, Paul Newman, on his white horse.

In the back room, the boys cook up a scheme to boost ticket sales: Get the biggest, baddest Indian of all times - Sitting Bull, recently surrendered to the US Army. So the call goes out and a great Indian (Will Sampson, Chief Broom) and his tiny, wizened companion (Frank Kaquitts) come into the compound. Of course, the small, silent Indian is Sitting Bull. He stays nearly mute for the whole movie, with Sampson speaking on his behalf.

The movie seems to be set up to compare the bluster, half-truths and mythologizing of Buffalo Bill and his crew against the deep dreams and clear mind of Sitting Bull. In one climactic scene, Bill sends Sitting Bull out in front of the audience with no script, no back up, nothing but an introduction. Sitting Bull rides around the ring once, and the audience boos. Silently, he rides around a second time and the audience cheers wildly.

This is a fun movie, in all the usual Altman ways - the scope, the busy-ness, the lived in world it creates. That's all without Kaquitts as Sitting Bull. Kaquitts is a native of the Stoney Indian First Nation in Canada, where this movie was filmed, and was elected their chief. He has amazing presence, silent and still. He also has more than one chance get a few digs in at the Cody, and through the power of his dreams, summons President Cleveland to the show.

I have not managed to mention Geraldine Chaplin as Annie Oakley, who is a great straightman to her nervous Frank Butler, John Considine. But now that I have, I should mention that Shelley Duvall plays the First Lady, newlywed Mrs. Cleveland. Somehow, I feel that having both Geraldine Chaplin and Shelley Duvall in the same movie is redundant.