Dances with Wolves (1990) - Essay Example

Dances with Wolves (1990) The epic American movie Dances with Wolves released in the year 1990 was directed and produced by Kevin Costner who was also the male protagonist, First Lieutenant John J. Dunbar. The story revolves around Dunbar who becomes stranded in a military post in the American frontier where he was confronted with a group of Lakota Indians. This film is not only noted because it was extremely well projected by a first time director, but also the film has delved on various themes like spiritual and social issues that are so much important for the Americans in this age. American history books are replete with the relation shared between the native people and the Euro Americans in the nineteenth century. Since the Europeans have always invaded America to defeat and dominate the natives, result was that many negative elements like fear, hatred, mistrust and guilt dictated all encounters between the two groups. Despite some critics expressing negative opinions about the film, “Costner’s vision of an alternate Lakota encounter with Americans has captured the imagination of Americans from a variety of social, economic, and racial backgrounds” (Castillo, 1991, p.14). The most remarkable aspect of this movie has been that the director has aesthetically explored the emotional facets of a co-culture, the Lakota culture. The writer has stimulated, without using preachy techniques, compassion and thoughtful consideration of this culture. There are some small scenes that bring forward the human sensitivities that are inherent in Lakota culture. There was a scene where the tribe’s medicine man, Kicking Bird and his wife were lying on the bed and viewers could sense anxiety and uncertainty in his expression. It was then shown that Kicking Bird pulled out one of his children’s dolls on which he had lain upon. This small and seemingly insignificant scene exposes to the viewers that parental feelings that common people experience in their lives are also present in a profound sense within the Lakota culture. With scenes like this, the director has successfully managed to portray the human side of this culture and such scenes have demonstrated that humanity is a common element inherent to all people regardless of their caste and community. In a multicultural society, it is inevitable that conflicts will exist. There can be process model or structural model of conflicts. In the process model there can be frustration which happens when one culture believes that their demands and dreams are being obstructed by the other culture. Frustration can be caused from poor communication that can occur between two cultures because of different languages or obstructions in their communication channel. Also, structural conflicts that may take place depending on the extent to which one culture is dependent on the other can also lead to frustration. Finally, frustration can arise from personal variables like values and characteristics that differ from one culture to another. The structural model of conflict has four parameters – 1) behavioral predisposition that includes capacities, objectives and personalities of each culture, 2) social pressure which means each culture is burdened with its own values and public interest, 3) incentive structure includes the kind of relationship that two or more cultures share with each other, and their level of competitiveness, and 4) rules and procedures are the elements that restrict the behavioral patterns of the cultures in conflict (Applebaum et al., 1998, pp.212-213). Therefore, according to Applebaum et al. (1998, p.213), “conflict can be defined as an interpersonal dynamic which is shaped by the internal and external environments of the parties involved and this dynamic is manifested in a process which affects group performance either functionally or dysfunctionally”. Seeing from the perspective of the above definition of conflict, this movie has portrayed the conflict of frustration between the Lakota Indians and the white men. In the introduction scene of the Indians, viewers could see that some Lakota Indians were conspiring to kill the white men since they thought the whites as interfering or domineering lot. In a subsequent scene, the Indians actually commit the murder when they kill a wagon driver who takes John to his new fort. Although this incident initially evokes hatred in the minds of viewers against the Lakota Indians, nevertheless with the progress of the movie viewers get to see the Indians from the perspective of John. This gives a whole new idea about the Indians and creates a bridge of sympathy between viewers and the Indians as acknowledged by John. The movie has also challenged a second kind of conflict which arises from different values and characteristics of different cultures. After getting so many chances to interact with the Indians, John was able to eliminate his pre-conceived notions about them. He could see that the Indians are not like the cruel and torturous people as he has always believed. The Indians have families and they have emotions and parental feelings towards their children, and also they live a normal routine life within their own cultural parameters just like any other so called superior cultures like the one in which John belongs. On the contrary, John gets to see the savage acts of his fellow whites. After he is wounded in the American Civil War, he is sent to the Great Plains where he can recover. There he gets involved in a Buffalo hunt with some Lakota people whom he has befriended. He then gets to witness corpses of a herd of buffaloes who have been freshly skinned. Such barbaric acts by his own cultural people made him so ashamed that he distanced himself from the Lakotas that night. Thus, the movie has managed to convey the message that the tendency of one culture to see the other cultures as inferior, which is core of most conflicts, is wrong since no culture is free from flaws or unethical and immoral behaviors. A solution to multicultural conflicts can come from an understanding of the cultural perceptions of the other culture. This is the ultimate message of this movie. John gets accepted by the Lakota Indians as a respected guest only when he learns their language, and with an open heart acknowledges their lifestyle and customs. References Applebaum, S.H., Shapiro, B. & Elbaz, D. (1998) The management of multicultural group conflict. Team Performance Management, 4(5), 211-34 Castillo, E.D. (1991) Dances with Wolves. Film Quarterly, 44(4), 14-23 Dances with Wolves (1990) directed by Kevin Costner Read More