This film actually won the only Oscar it was nominated for; which is great. But, as I have complained before, it should have nominated for A LOT more Oscars! I'm probably not going to stop harping on this, because it was a really disgusting way to "punish" director Michael Mann for what people in Hollywood saw as his personal mistreatment of Native American extras. First of all, there definitely was an issue about their housing; whether Mann was really aware of it is up for question--but that didn't stop Russell Means (who has a long history of putting himself in front of the media any chance he gets) and Daniel Day Lewis making it an outside issue with the media, rather than first try to do something about the problem internally. Russell Means is well known to anyone who is even a little acquainted with Native American civil rights fights and the American Indian Movement (AIM); what is not known is that Studi was involved with this in the early 1970's himself--he, like a lot of other people, including Means, was at the 1973 takeover of the Wounded Knee Memorial. Yet, he didn't get on board with what Means and Lewis were doing (and neither did the much younger Eric Schweig who played Uncas). But even if you believe that Mann had anything to do with the problem, and you agree that Means and Lewis were just trying to help; what kind of world is when an almost entirely white group of people decide to punish a white director for his mistreatment of Indians during filming by not nominating the Native American actor who so clearly deserved to be honored under the best supporting actor category?? That just seems as every bit racist, to me, as the original set housing for Native extras was in the first place. OK I'm done.
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| Won For Best Sound: Chris Jenkins, Doug Hemphill, Mark Smith & Simon Kaye |
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