The new Leonardo DiCaprio film about Hugh Glass the mountain man in the Rocky Mountain West was right up my street-at an AMC theater I only occasionally go to anymore. Set in 1820s Montana and Dakota Territory beaver pelt trappers from Missouri worked the frontier, competing with other fur companies, the French, hostile Arikaras & the unrelenting elements. The story is about his survival following a grizzly bear attack, then left alone for dead by his companions as they escape a savage Arikara attack for return to Fort Kiowa. A spiritual theme of honor persists throughout as Hugh Glass cares for his Pawnee son, following the death of Hawk's mother by French soldiers in the Mound villages. I believe the Mandans whom Lewis & Clark met along the Upper Missouri River were also in the region-not far from Sioux lands. Hugh Glass lives in the Native American tongue and philosophy of forbearance amid strife by respecting the wind, the trees through his humanity toward a Pawnee man eating buffalo meat as well as saving an Arikara woman being raped by Toussaint Charbonneau in the French camp. The French trade pelts with the Arikara but the Indians want horses instead; the Arikara are looking for the missing daughter Powage on the war path throughout the plot. Revenge is the main story line here as Hugh Glass seeks John Fitzgerald who took his rifle, supplies; betrayal by Fitzgerald ensues as he had agreed to stay with Glass and Jim Bridger to later be paid by Andrew Henry their leader gone ahead with the others for the fort.
The film is visually stunning with camera pans of great trees, ice-covered grasslands, golden spacious plains cut by what's likely portrayed as the Powder River country, the Yellowstone perhaps, the rapids scene, bison herds, elk crossing a stream and snow-covered mountains of avalanches, storms, bitter cold; the moon growing ever larger during this chronology in the winter landscapes! Hugh Glass makes it back alive, reclaiming his redemption as an Arikara party with the woman he saved trot past him on the river bank, following his encounter with Fitzgerald. This movie has been nominated for 12 Academy Awards, a great engaging performances comparable to Jeremiah Johnson, Dances With Wolves, Cast Away or even The Martian which I also saw on DVD this week.
