Buffalo Soldiers (1997)

Simply A Masterpiece

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

This movie tries so hard to be funny, yet it falls flat every time. Just another example of recycled ideas repackaged with women in an attempt to appeal to a certain audience.

I enjoyed the movie, it's good entertainment. I have to compare the movie to older westerns rather than newer movies that try to be super realistic. If you compare this with movies made up through the 1970's then it's good. Somewhere along the line people started demanding more accurate historical movies, and I do appreciate authenticity and accuracy. This movie at least gets me asking questions to find out the real story... isn't that what movies do well in the first place? Those reviewers who criticize the movie as "propaganda" are looking for realism. They are also looking for "propaganda" so they can get upset about "left-wing Hollywood", and forget that movies are first entertainment. This movie is dark and brooding at times and takes you along with it. The only complaint I have is definitely the ending where they have "Victoria" surrounded and he surrendered, his soldiers were kneeling with the rifles above their heads in surrender. All the buffalo soldiers had to do was disarm them and the climactic scene following at the end would never had happened. It made no sense, not because it was "propaganda", it just was a silly ending. But Hollywood is full of silly endings that have no political bent...sorry, I just don't get that twist. Sure the movie makes you think and tries to put you in the shoes and times of the Buffalo soldier and it can go over board, but so do most movies especially military movies where they try to make "heroes" and "villains" out of regular people...just to drive the story. That's what happens here.

Anyone who says this is 'revisionist history' is in denial. The movie is about Victorio's War, which was part of the Apache Wars. To see how the Apache Wars ended, see the movie Geronimo (1993). The dialogue is less Victorian and more like Western movies, but it has a lot of jokes that serve to show the characters' personalities outside of their jobs as soldiers, so it works. My only disappointment is that the opening credits run during the best part of the movie - the religious ritual that the Apache are performing before they flee from their poverty-stricken reservation. It strikes me as disrespectful to run credits during any religious content. However, the Native Americans are played by Native American actors and the Mescalero-Chiricahua language is spoken, so Native Americans are portrayed in a positive way, not a stereotypical one. In the movie, the buffalo soldiers variously respect and mistreat the Apache, because if they fail to arrest the Natives, black people in general will look like unfit soldiers. It's simultaneously harsh and uplifting.

Picking this movie up from the library shelf, I didn't read anything on the box about it being historically accurate or factual so I didn't expect to get a history lesson by watching it. For a one hundred minute made for TV movie I wasn't at all disappointed, and felt entertained for the time I invested in it. Besides being filmed on location, it appeared a good effort was made in the uniform and prop department and it did not have a Hollywood look or feel to it. I would recommend this movie to those who like westerns; and don't have an eye and ear for knowing it all, or watch movies for their political or social messages. I did notice that their 1873 Colt's had the wrong frame for the time period, and the cylinders weren't beveled as they should have been, but I guess we all have to find fault somewhere, even us simple mined folk. Watch it, and enjoy it for what it is.

An interesting tale of the Indian Wars. Glover carries the movie as the taciturn n.c.o. still on the receiving end of racism from so called fellow officers .An Indian renegade is on the loose and the US cavalry need to hunt him down and capture or kill him to make the west a safer place The film is a pleasant way to spend an evening not too challenging or provocative, but compelling and compassionate. The rapport between the troops is perhaps too nineties but in essence it is amusing.An interesting counterpoint to the movie Geronimo where the Indians were less one dimensional