Comparing Dances with Wolves with The Searchers

Dances With Wolves, directed by Kevin Costner, and The Searchers, directed by John Ford, looks into the fabric of this country's past. The media has created a false image of the relationship between Native Americans and White men to suppress the cruel and unfortunate reality. Both directors wanted to contradict these stereotypes, but due to the time period the films were created, only one film was successful. Unlike The Searchers, Dancing With Wolves presents a truly realistic representation of Native Americans. Both Dances With Wolves and The Searchers protagonists, Dunbar and Ethan, embark on a journey and evolve in different ways.

The film, Dances with Wolves, staring Kevin Costner gives a historically accurate presentation of the Sioux Indians and their way of life. In this production, Lieutenant John Dunbar, played by Costner, is rewarded for his heroic actions in the Civil War by being offered an opportunity to see the American frontier before it is gone. Dunbar is assigned to an abandoned fort where his only friends are a lone wolf and his beloved horse, Cisco. After several weeks of waiting for more American troops, a Sioux Indian makes contact with Dunbar and reports this finding to his chief. This incident sets off a train of events that would forever change John Dunbar and the Sioux tribe he encounters.

During Jack London’s life he has written many great novels, perhaps the greatest was White Fang. In 1906 he wrote the legendary novel about a stray wolf reverting to domestication. The majority of this book concerns White Fangs’ struggles with savage nature, Indians, dogs and white men. However, we also see White Fang is tamed by love and turns from a savage wolf into a loving and domesticated dog. White Fang begins with two men traveling through the artic with a dog team and sled, followed by a pack of famished wolves who pick off the dogs, one by one at night and eventually gets one of the men.

The original wolves were very different from the ones that were planted. So while environmentalists thought they were helping to level out environmental problems, they succeeded in doing the opposite, by bringing back the wrong kind of wolves they started, depleting elk populations, and wild game. In 1995 the environmentalists started to repopulate the wolves. The wolves started spreading like rabbits, across many states including Idaho, Wyoming, Utah, and Washington. The main area in the spot light would be Yellowstone because of the national park there it instantly hit the News and Press.

In the movie Dances with Wolves Lieutenant John Dunbar is a dynamic character; changing throughout the film from a dignified United States Army soldier, to a passionate Lakota Sioux member. On his journey, Dances With Wolves takes in many experiences many have only dreamt about. When he rides Cisco out onto the battlefield in a suicide attempt, he has no idea that he indeed will live and will never lead the same life again. John Dunbar changed in many ways reflected upon in the film, including: mindset, clothing, and his sense of identity; it is though these character traits that Dances With Wolves discovers that inside everyone is a frontier just waiting to be explored. When the Dunbar is first assigns himself to Fort Sedgwick, and sees that it is abandoned, he is still intent on staying, despite the guffaws of Timmons, a peasant who delivers him there.

Dances With Wolves Dances with Wolves offers a cinematic portrayal of Native Americans that is quite contrary to the stereotypical norm. In this film, John Dunbar, goes out to the west where he meets and becomes friends with the Sioux Indians. He is drawn more and more into their community and eventually chooses to side with the humane Indians over his fellow cruel white Americans. In an attempt to change stereotypical views, director Kevin Costner through Dunbar, presents to the audience a different perspective of Indian removal. The film allows viewers to identify and sympathize with the Indians and thus causes a shift of perception towards the Indian problem.

In the film, Dances with Wolves," John Dunbar approaches the Indians with this same apprehension. He is a white America who is alone on the frontier. He may be scared of the supposed "savages," but he never lets on. The stereotypical Indian is a brutal savage-like beast who kills for the sake of killing and ravages the countryside. In the first scene of the movie, this is the image that I received.

The Indian and the White Communites in Dances with Wolves and Machimanito The film Dances with Wolves shares a lot of its content with the story Machimanito. In Dances with Wolves, two nations come to interact with each other. While the white man is dominating the land, the Indians are trying to protect both their land and themselves. In Machimanito, the story describes the epidemic and its effects on the Indians, while describing the ongoing conflict between Indians and the white man. There is a huge cultural difference between the white man and the Indians, which is reflected on their ways of life and communities; each lives a different life style including their interaction with nature and themselves, their authority within this community and finally the resulting conflict the interactions of these two nations.

Restoring Wolves to Yellowstone In his book, Never Cry Wolf, Farley Mowat tells an Inuit tale, saying that in the beginning, caribou were created for humans to hunt. However, humans “hunted only the big, fat caribou, for they had no wish to kill the weak and the small and the sick,” creating a weak population of caribou. The creator then made wolves to eat the sick, weak, and small caribou, creating a natural health and balance to the earth (124). Humans have traditionally seen wolves as a competitor and a danger, but these misconceptions can now be put to rest. Because wolves regulate the carrying capacity, preserve the health of herds, and complete the ecological cycle in a balanced system, they must be restored to Yellowstone.

The wolf has often played an arguable role in people’s mind; however, in some cultures like the Native American one, the wolf is seen as a guide who can show humanity the way to get closer to their roots. In some other cultures, the wolf has been seen as the villain or as the wolf who tried to eat children or even as the one who is wearing a sheep suit to rule the real sheep to be able to eat them. However in indigenous or Native cultures, the wolf has been given a lot of great qualities. The wolf can be the pathfinder, way shower, and community builder, showing qualities like loyalty, protection, and companionship. The wolf has also been seen in the role of teacher, and healer.