War Party

During a peaceful reconstitution of an old battle between Indians and American soldiers, an Indian is killed with true munitions by a boozed white man and racial tension explodes again and again and again...

The first sequence is unique, beginning with a close up of a feather flowing to the corpse of a dead Indian, then we discover more and more surprising situations. There are a lot of surprising situations, shot in amazing Montana locations.

What a pity, War Party is unavailable in br or even dvd, only in vintage VHS or on YouTube. It really deserves recognition. Director Franc Roddam has shot very few movies, I've only seen Quadrophenia about mods in England, at the total opposite of War Party. Hanx PG.

I remember when I was about 13 years old this movie was filmed in my hometown and on my reservation. I was very anxious to watch it and eagerly looked at the places I lived near all my young life as they appeared onscreen.

Being an enrolled Blackfeet Indian it is easy for me to get caught up in the whole nature of this film, because, after all, this is a film about Blackfeet indians. I choose to look at it in a different way though. The plot is far fetched to say the least and the movie is quite silly all together. I enjoyed watching it, but it's not an altogether good film. It really doesn't make any profound statement or stir up any topic of discussion. If this was a movie that was intended to take an in depth look at indians and then provoke some sort of emotion, well then, it failed completely at that direction.

I choose to believe that War Party was made to be entertaining and not thought provoking though. A sort of "what if this really did happen" type of movie that gives the watcher a chance to see a wild happenstance that wouldn't occur in todays society. An interesting film if you are a film struck young man who has grown up in the area where it was shot, but not much more than a boring night in front of your tv and VCR if you are anybody else in this world. The most significant accomplishment this movie has done is it helped launch the career of Billy Worth who is now foraying from acting and becoming a director to reckon with in the near future.

In the 1988 version of "War Party" we see the classic struggle for justice and equal treatment that all our Native brothers face. The whole underlying theme to this film would be the issue of racism in and among our border towns. I liked the movie more when I was 12 years old than I do now understanding the reverse effect movies like this sometimes bring. I feel that it was a great film of its day. Billy Wirth had an outstanding performance as "Sonny". I would have liked to seen him play more parts in films such as this one. Bradley N.C.

This film will probably remind people of a indian rosewood. But this storyline isn't so accurate,the action scenes are like a circus especially the carnival fight(It reminded me of a soprano episode last week)When do modern day police use double barreld shotguns and old fashion 45 peacemakers, not to mention the level action rifles I thought it was supposed to take place in the 80's. Somehow it appears that the national guard soilders at the end of the movie think there in Vietnam,they play volleyball while camping out in the badlands waiting to capture the two young indian suspects.Released in '89 this was probably the beginning of the politically correct era in movies. It came out a year and a half before Dances with Wolves,and the indians are no longer the bad guys.The movie on the other hand will entertain you with comic book action and will also so get you mad seeing the unjustice & racsim that the indians are going through.

The setting is in the present, but the problems are eternal for American-Indians; the white man has stolen their land, but they cannot take away the Indian heritage. Dillion does a good job, as does Cher, I mean Sonny. The young actors carry most of the film, but it is the story that is the real star of the film. Modern Indian life is little better than it was a hundred years ago. An entertaining film that had the feeling of Rambo at times, and Thelma and Louise at other times. An entertaining film and recommended.