The West par Robert Redford

I am an Englishman interested in the history of the American West, and over the last 50 years have read numerous factual accounts of the period. I have just seen the first episode of this series, and while visually interesting, it does seem to play fast and loose with historical facts. There is no mention of native-American Sioux chief Red Cloud, who was the only tribal chief to defeat the American army, resulting in a peace treaty and the creation of the Great Sioux Reservation. However I can see that this series has been made for the benefit of the masses, and not for any true historian of the period.

"From the ashes of the Civil War", comes a period of rapid settlement of the American West. Much of the West was controlled by tribes of Indians, but it offered one solution to the festering resentment and conflicts that followed the war.

Also, there were some rebel soldiers who continued to fight against Northern supremacy and order. Jesse James and his gang began to terrorize and strike at Northern interests.

This is how "The American West"--an eight part series executive produced by Robert Redford--begins. With voice overs and reenactments, the show details the beginnings of what becomes a two-front war that General Grant wages from Washington.

The credentials of the historians who add their remarks are impressive. There certainly is a wealth of academic inquiry available to the makers of this show. Still, this is a true story that seems to be painted with a broad brush. And it does not answer some key questions about the motivations and actions of some of the actors in this vast drama.

It does, however, establish a basic framework that viewers can build upon with personal reading and further scholarship. As always, history is a complex matter, and the outline provided by this series leaves plenty of room for a more refined understanding.

THe American West series is a entertaining look at various stories/myths of the American West. As you can imagine Hollywood takes some literary license with the facts but does present a compelling series of one hour shows. THe series does feature well known western historians such as Dr Paul Hutton as well as other familiar faces for commentary.

This is a good place to start exploring the fascinating history of the old west. Just don't take the contents of the shows for being gospel. After all, this is Hollywoods version of history.

The only real detraction in the series I found was the producers repeated insistence on having commentary by actors such as Robert Redford, Burt Reynolds and other actors who make their living memorizing lines written by others. Considering that most of these people barely have a high school education, let alone any expertise in American history, it is hard to believe that the producers seriously thought that these people, as well as politicians like John McCain, would add any significant insights or information to the series. Apparently the producers take the audience for being too stupid to recognize a washed up old actor as some type of subject matter expert because he starred in a movie about the West. Putting aside that only criticism The American West is an engaging look at one of the most exciting and historically important periods in American History. I recommend it.

This review is based on the version shown in Europe under the title "Robert Redford's The West". I'm not aware of any differences apart from the title and I'd be surprised if there were given the skimpy production values of the series. The series of eight one-hour shows sets out to tell the tale of the West through six lives Custer, Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull, Jesse James, Billy the Kid and Wyatt Earp. We get a narrative over reenactments interspersed with to-camera pieces from lots of actors who appeared in Westerns and some actual historians. I found the series very disappointing. The recreation of the Little Big Horn would embarrass a troop of amateur re-enactors. More substantial is the myriad inaccuracies and omissions. In telling the tale of the James brothers I don't recall a mention of the Younger Brothers. We're shown a map of the Battle of the Little Big Horn that shows Reno's and Custer's advances but doesn't show Benteen's nor is he mentioned in the narrative. Billy the Kid's escape all happens on the ground floor. There's no Pete Maxwell in Pete Maxwell's bedroom when Billy is shot. The viewer is given no context as to why either man was in the room (the link being Maxwell). As presented Morgan and Virgil Earp are shot on the same night. Others more knowledgeably than myself have and could point out many more flaws in the series. Did I learn anything? Yes. A young John Wayne met an elderly Wyatt Earp.

For me and for most Americans there is nothing more interesting than the story of the West. From the Civil War until World War 1, the West was full of adventure, opportunity, drama and tragedy. AMCs series "Hell on Wheels" was an excellent attempt to portray one aspect of this period, the building of the railroads. But their far more ambitious "The American West" is a big disappointment on a number of levels.

For a documentary, the use of "expert" opinion from movie stars is hardly a good idea. Have we stooped so low that we get our history from movie stars?

Perhaps the reliance on movie stars for the primary documentation is one of the reasons this 8 part series has so many errors (e.g., Jesse James and Billy the Kid met, Wyatt Earp went to Tombstone to be their Sheriff).

Another weakness of the series is that there is no real underlying theme. There are brief episodes about Jesse James (Missouri), Billy the Kid (New Mexico), Wyatt Earp (Kansa and Arizona), and Custer and Sitting Bull (the Dakotas). But there is no real glue that holds the episodes together (e.g., the demands of capitalism to obtain natural resources, the political post war climate, the economic problems and the challenges of currency, etc.)

Telling the story of the West is an important project, but this series fails to do it in a meaningful way. FWIW - I really like the TV series "Centennial" (1978-79) and "Hell on Wheels" (2011-16). They both gave a comprehensive history of the West and did so in a more entertaining manner. For sheer pleasure, "Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid" (1973) is my favorite telling of this story.