Little Big Man (1970)

Jack Crabb (Dustin Hoffman) is a very old man - 121 years - when the historian came to interview him about his time in the West.  Jack outlines his life in which he experienced all the Old West had to do.  His parents were killed by a Pawnee attack.  He was raised by Cheyenne.  He was 'rescued' from the Indians when he was a teenager and pressed into religion.  He tried being a Cheyenne warrior - which earned him the name Little Big Man, a churchgoer, a snake oil salesman, a gunfighter - the Soda Pop Kid, a businessman, an army muleskinner, a drunkard, a mountain man, a trapper, a husband, a father, and an angel of vengeance.  His grandfather, Old Lodge Skins (Chief Dan George), is a recurring presence, always offering wisdom and prophecy on the occasions when Jack finds his way back to the tribe.

There are two primary threads to the movie.  One follows Younger Bear, a Cheyenne warrior who owes Little Big Man a life.  Younger Bear is very bitter about this state of affairs and never pleased to see that his rival yet lives.  The other is George Armstrong Custer (Richard Mulligan), who first appears as a dashing cavalry officer who suggests Jack go West.  However, in later encounters, he finds Custer to be repellent and something of a self-important oaf.  These two threads meet at the Little Bighorn.

Jack is a hapless character, who bounces from one failure to the next.  Hoffman gives him a naive quality.  He is never sure of himself, always speaking with uncertainty and hesitation.  He is a tumbleweed, mostly traveling where the wind takes him.  When he does choose a path, it inevitably ends in failure.

Old Lodge Skins is the best part of the movie.  He is the perfect grandfather, with nuggets of wisdom, spirit visions that invariably come to pass, and a "today is a good day to die" attitude about life.  Walking across a battlefield while invisible was both hilarious and tragic.  It is no surprise he won an Oscar.

Custer was portrayed as a dull-witted fool.  His bravery was attributed to his stupidity.  He proclaimed that he could tell a man's profession by looking at him, which is how Jack became an Army muleskinner.  He led his column into the disastrous attack at Little Bighorn, despite doubts among his officer, because Jack told him to do it.  Despite knowing that Jack wished him ill, he did a reverse-reverse psychology and rode to his death.

An array of other characters make appearances.  Mrs. Pendrake (Faye Dunaway) is first a devout Christian and later a soiled dove (i.e. prostitute).  Allardyce T Meriweather (Martin Balsam) is a snake oil salesman who keeps losing limbs to his dangerous profession.  Wild Bill Hickok (Jeff Corey) turns Jack away from gunfighting, but later hauls him out of his drunken stupor.  Of course, the Cheyenne have a cast of characters who change over time.  In addition to grandfather and Younger Bear, there was Shadow That Comes in Sight, the warrior who brought him back to the tribe as a child, Little Horse, a Cheyenne boy who chose to live as a woman.

The movie is in no ways historically accurate, but it does look at the Old West from a different perspective than the typical Western.  It is a lot of fun.  Recommended.