In the first of Kevin Costner’s four-part Horizon: An American Saga, pioneers head west in search of the so-called Promised Land, park their wagons and build a new town. The only problem is, they’re trespassing on Apache land, and the natives aren’t happy about it.
The first chapter of this Civil War-era saga, hitting theaters June 28, focuses primarily on white settlers and the U.S. military, but the film also takes audiences inside the White Mountain Apache community to hear the chief and his sons discuss the incursion and their differing views on the violent response from some in the tribe.
Given the historically insensitive portrayals of Native Americans in film over the years, the Native American actors who signed on for Horizon wanted to make sure the storyline and portrayal wasn’t controversial — that the men wouldn’t just be the bad guys and the women their “overly sexualized” companions.
“As a Native American actor, when you’re doing a Western you have to be very careful and cautious about what you get involved in,” Tatanka Means, who is of Navajo, Oglala Lakota, Yankton Dakota and Omaha descent, tells Yahoo Entertainment.
While Means said it’s always important to dig into a script and “research it and dissect it thoroughly,” he said the ‘Killers of the Flower Moon’ actor also said who is involved in the storytelling makes a big difference.
Costner earned the respect of many Native Americans for his 1990 Academy Award-winning film Dances with Wolves, not only for casting a large Native American cast, but also for his relatable portrayal of the characters.
“I think there was a rapport built with Kevin and the way he worked on Dances with Wolves and other Westerns,” explained Means, who plays Apache warrior Takrisim in Horizon.
“As a Native woman, it was really important to me that we were portrayed accurately,” said Chief Wasse of the Oglala Lakota.
The chief plays Taklisim’s wife, Liluye, who is not shy about giving her opinion on her family’s next move.
“We were a matriarchal society, so we didn’t necessarily have to listen to everything the men had to say,” she told Yahoo, “so I loved that Kevin portrayed Native American women as really strong and independent and not tied down in any way by men.”
Owen Crow Shoe, an Indigenous actor from the Piikani and Blackfoot Confederated Blood Tribes who plays Taklisim’s brother, Pionsenai, agreed with Means’s views.
“I knew it was a Kevin Costner movie and I knew how passionate he is about portraying Native Americans. [made a difference]”When you read the script, you see that the characters are not just simple warriors who just kill, kill, kill,” he said.
That said, there is violence in the film — not just between settlers and Apaches, but between settlers themselves — and there is indeed a scalping of a Native American that the chief acknowledges could be “triggering.”
Owen Crow Shoe as Peoncenay leads an Apache family in “Horizon: An American Saga Chapter One.” (Courtesy of Richard Foreman/Warner Bros./Everett Collection)
Some critics have questioned the film’s portrayal of Native American characters and the amount of time they are given on screen. Reviewing the film’s Cannes premiere, David Rooney of The Hollywood Reporter argued that it “took an uncomfortably long time to demonstrate sensitivity to its Native American characters,” while Owen Gleiberman of Variety wrote that “when it comes to Native American issues, the film is not without its problems.” Steve Pond of The Wrap questioned whether Native American characters “could get more screen time in the next chapter.”
Costner acknowledged in press materials that Horizon is “told primarily from the perspective of the settlers, but it was very important to me to show the Native Americans with their dignity and ferocity, because they were fighting for their way of life, their religion and their existence.”
He added, “You can’t share the land, so the settlers decided to take it. They made it seem like they were willing to share the land, but it was just to get a foothold. They didn’t really want to compete, and they pushed about 500 Native American tribes from ocean to ocean. That’s the true story. That’s why Horizon explores the Native American side as well.”
Exploring the Native American side of the story also meant weaving Apache language into the dialogue, and Means, Chief and Crow Shoe took lessons from Apache language teacher and consultant Aurelia Bliss and translator Elva Case.
“It was really challenging. [Means and Crow Shoe] “Owen had more lines than I did. He gave the best performance in the movie,” says the Lakota-speaking chief. “I was just amazed at the amount of lines he had, because it’s such a difficult language and I was worried.”
“I speak Blackfoot myself, but I hadn’t really heard much Apache before this project, so it was a whole new experience for me,” Crow Shoe said. “I always had it in the back of my mind that Apache people would be watching the show and we had to give the language its due recognition.”
While the Apache story has yet to be told in the Horizon Saga (Chapter 2 hits theaters on August 16), Chief and Crow Shoe shared what they want audiences to take away from Chapter 1.
“I just hope that Native people will see this and feel proud that we’re portrayed as a strong people, because we always have been and always will be a very strong people,” the chief said. “We showed a lot of kindness, but we also showed the strength that we’ve always had.”
For Crow Shoe, it’s about showing Indigenous communities “we’re still here.”
“We are still a strong people, we are still a powerful people,” he said, “and we always will be.”
Horizon: An American Saga Chapter 1 will hit theaters on June 28th.
