Flutist John Two-Hawks poses with actress Anna Paquin, who portrays Elaine Goodale in HBO's "Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee" set to air Sunday night. Viewers tuning in to HBO's "Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee" at 8 p.m.
Sunday will find two local connections to the faraway story. The first, of course, is the author of the book on which the "docudrama" was based. Dee Brown, who grew up in Arkansas, was just out of high school in 1927 when he covered the Green Forest tornado for the Harrison Daily Times - a sideline to his printshop job.
Viewers tuning in to HBO's "Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee" at 8 p.m. Sunday will find two local connections to the faraway story.
The first, of course, is the author of the book on which the "docudrama" was based. Dee Brown, who grew up in Arkansas, was just out of high school in 1927 when he covered the Green Forest tornado for the Harrison Daily Times - a sideline to his printshop job. From there, he went to college, became a librarian and began writing dozens of novels, including the 1970 "Bury My Heart," which sold five million copies.
The second connection is flutist John Two-Hawks, who makes his home outside Eureka Springs when he is not touring and recording. His work has also been featured on The History Channel and National Public Radio, his Web site says. Two-Hawks, a Lakota Indian, provides flute, hand drum and vocalizations for the film score by George Clinton.
An Associated Press article says Daniel Giat, the screenwriter, said he selected the story of the Lakota partly because the Wounded Knee massacre occurred on Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. He said the film allowed him to tell the stories of people such as Sitting Bull and humanize them. It had been hard for a white audience to sympathize with such characters because they had always been depicted as saints, not as human beings, Giat said.
He said the movie depicts Sitting Bull as a flawed man, proud and vain. The human factor allows viewers to feel for him all the more because of what he does to keep his people together, Giat said. Adam Beach plays Charles Eastman, a Lakota-born doctor who exemplifies the struggle of American Indians in assimilation.
Beach said he gained a respect for Eastman during the filming. "I think a lot of Indian people will leave with ownership of their spirit and strength. .
.. I feel fortunate to be part of HBO's project in telling the truths to that story," he said.
The film also stars Aidan Quinn as Senator Henry Dawes, August Schellenberg as Sitting Bull, and Anna Paquin as Eastman's confidante, Elaine Goodale. The New York Times reports that Brown's distrust of Hollywood helped stop two attempts to make a movie of his book and his grandson said Brown, who died in 2002, had not believed anything would come of the current project but "nobody had ever before gone and gutted and turned it into a love story.
News RSS