Reverse Shot A different angle on moving images—past, present, and future

Les Cowboys is the latest neo-noir to draw inspiration from The Searchers. As the Indian captivity myth (and specific cases of Comanche abductions of female settlers) inspired the 1954 novel by Alan Le May, the revered John Ford adaptation has spawned its own progeny.

First-time feature director Zhao resists courting our sympathy by presenting the family life as squalid, though many Pine Ridge families live without heating, clean water, or sanitation.

Considering herself intellectually null at the time (despite her reading Schopenhauer between takes), Brooks can be regarded as Pandora’s Box “auteur“ or “visionary“ after the fact only, and then, of course, in a spiritual rather than a literal sense.

Since the committing of atrocities is rarely recorded and documentaries seldom show those that are—no one in his or her right mind would want to see them—it follows that fictional cinema’s representation of genocidal acts carries the ultimate burden of representation.