By Jennifer Michaels
DEFA used a variety of settings, mostly in Eastern
Europe, to represent the American West. Many of the films were co-productions
with studios in Bulgaria, Yugoslavia, Romania, Mongolia, and even Cuba, where
part of Osceola was filmed. Filming in Yugoslavia, where the West German
westerns were also filmed, was particularly helpful since DEFA could use sets
left behind from the Winnetou films and could also rely on experienced extras
who had already played in the West German westerns. Another advantage of filming
in Eastern Europe was that people in South East Europe had darker skins, which
made it easier to represent them as “Indians”. 24 In the DEFA films, the extras
are portrayed as somewhat backward, as primitive and almost childlike, in
contrast to the heroic, resolute chiefs played by Mitic. DEFA frequently used
non-professional actors. For example, the slaves in Osceola were actually
African students studying in the GDR. 25 Not only were locations in Eastern
Europe only an approximation of the American West, but they also presented some
challenges. For example, while filming Trail of the Falcon in the Caucasus wood
to build the tipis was stolen.
Because the DEFA films were not bound by the May model set among the Mescalero Apaches, they attempted to give a broader picture of different tribes and time periods. Tribes depicted include, for example, the Dakotas (Die Söhne der großen Bärin, 1966, The Sons of the Great Mother Bear; Spur des Falken, 1968, Trail of the Falcon; Weiße Wölfe, 1969, White Wolves); Apaches (Apachen, 1973; Ulzana, 1974); Mohicans, Hurons, and Delawares (Chingachgook, 1967); Shoshones (Tödlicher Irrtum, 1970, Deadly Mistake); Seminoles (Osceola, 1971); Shawnee (Tecumseh, 1972); Cheyenne (Weiße Wölfe; Blutsbrüder, 1975, Blood Brothers); Nez Percé (Der Scout, 1983); and Iroquois (Blauvogel, 1979, Blue Bird). Of the above Blue Bird is the only one not narrated from what DEFA viewed as a Native American perspective. The films address Native American tribes only at a specific point in time, and their plots are predictable, showing incidents of Native American resistance to the encroaching whites. No attempts are made to understand their lives over time. While they include such Eastern and Southern tribes as the Hurons, Delawares and Seminoles, like most westerns they focus on defeated and vanishing tribes of the American West. The term “Indianer” has long been associated in the Euro-American and particularly the German imagination with Plains Indians 27 so it is not surprising that such tribes feature prominently in DEFA’s films. Since the late 19th century, “the befeathered and mounted warriors of the plains had become the dominant Indian stereotype within popular culture”. 28
DEFA films are always sympathetic to Native Americans’ struggles for existence and glorify their “courage and integrity”. 29 Native Americans are portrayed as noble and peaceful and they want to live in friendship with the whites. Several films depict an idyllic life in villages where Native Americans live in harmony with nature – until the whites burn the village and kill women, children and old people. Reflecting a growing environmental consciousness they imagine “the Indians” as living a wholesome life amidst nature in sharp contrast to the many smoky and often violent saloon scenes where the whites drink and gamble. Native Americans become hostile only to defend themselves, to escape from barren reservations, or to revenge massacres. They are the “good guys” fighting bravely and hopelessly for their freedom against overwhelming odds as ever-more white settlers flood into the West. In the film of the same name the chief Tecumseh likens whites to swarms of mosquitoes. In contrast to many American westerns of the time, which present conquering the West as a triumph and an important step in nation building and which celebrate the heroism of cowboys and settlers, DEFA films sympathize with the victims of such “progress”.
In the depiction of imperialism colonialism and genocide these films sharply criticize the United States and they stress the close connection between capitalism militarism and racism (the GDR considered itself anti-racist, and DEFA took the high moral ground in these films). 30 In most of the Indianerfilme there is a gulf between white Americans and Native Americans. Unlike the West German westerns close friendships between whites and Native Americans are rarely shown, and only a few good whites appear. One exception is Blood Brothers, whose script was written by the American singer and songwriter Dean Reed, who moved to the GDR for political reasons, in which the white Harmonika, played by Reed, and the Cheyenne chief, played by Mitic, become blood brothers. Another is the good sheriff in White Wolves. Otherwise most American whites are depicted as greedy, violent and vicious. They are bandits, fat capitalists, rich mine owners, and land speculators, such as the aptly named Bludgeon in Trail of the Falcon. Some even have pointed teeth to signify their predatory nature. They not only fight against “the Indians”, but also against each other, shoot the buffalo so that Native Americans have no food, and massacre Native Americans. More and more whites steal their land, break treaties made with Native Americans at will when for example gold is found in the Black Hills, and murder them, encouraged by the government bounty offered for Native American scalps, emphasizing that Native Americans are treated like animals, and undermining the notion that only “Indians” take scalps.
A frequent scene in American westerns is when the cavalry
rides to rescue the settlers from “the Indians”, thereby playing the heroic
role of saviors. In the Indianerfilme, however, the cavalry, representing the
military, is always shown as an instrument of government oppression that
protects the capitalists and hunts down and murders “the Indians”. One of many
such examples is in Blood Brothers, which begins with the Sand Creek massacre
in which the cavalry slaughter peaceful Cheyenne, mostly women and children.
DEFA films also depict the cavalry’s participation in the forced removal of
Native Americans from their fertile lands to rocky, barren reservations.
[To be continued]
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