Admittedly, "The American Buffalo" can be tough viewing, especially part one. But as I mentioned in my review header, it's also essential viewing. We should not and cannot live in ignorance of the past.
As one might guess, this film is about the American Bison. A better title might have been "A Cautionary Tale" or "American Holocaust," as those capture more of the essence of the material. What we are given here is a history of the bison, but because Americans hadn't really encountered it much before 1800, it's really a history of its last 220 or so years. And what an ugly history it is.
At the dawn of the 19th century the bison numbered in the millions, by some estimates 10 million or more, and by the 1880s there were perhaps fewer than 1000 left. Part one goes into great detail explaining how greed, callousness, indifference, and just plain evil made this possible.
It's very difficult not to be angered by the revelations made here of the crimes committed at the time. One despicable individual, a certain Lord George Gore, killed thousands of animals, including bison, on a 3-year hunting expedition to the West, apparently getting a thrill out of the excessive blood he shed. Many more engaged in the carnage because, as is so often the case, there was money to be made. The majority of the bison were slaughtered purely for economic reasons, as their hides, tongues and other body parts could be converted into cash. Hunters would kill them by the hundreds, day after day, and leave their carcasses to rot all over the Great Plains. I can't think of a better word to describe this madness than "sickening." And as an American, it's utterly embarrassing.
Part two details the slow reclamation and salvation of the bison, such as there is. Through the efforts of various people (some more honorable than others), the film informs that as of today (2023), the species has rebounded to number roughly 350,000. A far cry from 10 million but enough to guarantee its future it seems.
Burns has made the film in his now-recognizable style. Photographs from the time period are intertwined with musical excerpts, diary entries and interviews with historians and witnesses or their descendants, including a healthy dose of recollections from Native Americans. At one point some journal entries from the Lewis & Clark expedition are read by a voice actor, and here Burns re-uses some music from his earlier Lewis & Clark documentary, a nice easter egg for those familiar with that excellent program.
A few times Burns goes on a seemingly irrelevant or non-essential tangent, like when he gives something of a biography of the Comanche chief Quanah Parker. Mildly interesting, but the film could have been made without it. These tangents are only a minor gripe, though. Overall there is a lot here to digest, and to ponder. I can only hope the journey of the American Bison, along with the near-extinction of the American Eagle in the 20th century, will serve as warnings and cautionary tales we absolutely must heed going forward.
9/10. Burns fills in another gap of the American Experience, and this time, does it painfully well.
