The Lone Ranger. I had to see it. I’ve been reading a lot of critiques over the lame Native stereotyping and yes, there is validity to the complaint. But, I’ve also been talking with friends who went to see it and liked it – Native friends, as well as non-Natives. Some see it as a spoof of the way old Westerns always demeaned Natives. Some see it as the Native Django — “Tonto gets to kill evil white guys.”
When I was a kid watching the original TV show, Jimmy Johnson and I would always root for Tonto. Then again, we always rooted for the “Indians.”
I went and saw it with a buddy — a Native guy from Wyoming — a Vietnam sniper. He liked it. He’s one who saw it as a spoof. “Funny, but way too long …mediocre plot…even the music was bad, other than they finally got William Tell in there near that long ending” was his final assessment.

Well, it is a spoof. A bad one. A long leap from Blazing Saddles or Paint Your Wagon, though you could span the huge gap with the exploding mine shaft of Western cliches it contains.
It’s more like Will Smith’s Wild, Wild West. You can’t watch it without getting in some laughs — many for the telegraphed jokes and sight gags sheer stupidity, than for their cleverness. It’s a lame story, but maybe a bit better than Wild, Wild West, however.
The original Tonto was an Amos & Andy caricature of a lone Potawatomi warrior. (Plausible only because many of his nation were force-relocated to the southwest (Oklahoma) from the Great Lakes region. This Tonto is Comanche, driven crazy and is an outcast because of his childhood part in saving two evil white men who then massacre his people for silver.
Somehow Monument Valley, Promontory Point, Canyonlands and Sierra forests are all in Texas/Indian Country. Buffalo roam Monument Valley. And Tonto is a Wendigo hunter — a cannibalistic creature from Algonquin (read: Eastern seacoast) lore. Historical and Geographical accuracy never enter the picture.

It is racist – in the way that gives us sidekicks like Jar Jar Binks or Mr. Yunioshi (or any number of Bruce Willis or Eddie Murphy flicks) …and there are tons of Magical Indian cliches and Tonto slips from using words like “fatigued” to pidgin and stilted nonsense like “Greetings, noble spirit horse” unaccountably. The “sacred fool” (Tonto means “idiot” in the Spanish spoken in the Southwest) and the “wendigo hunter” tropes are repeated throughout. And the dead bird he wears on his head and keeps feeding just comes off as bizarre — though some say that Crazy Horse went to battle with a dead red tail hawk on his head.
Would it be problematic stereotyping if Tonto was played by a Native, not Johnny Depp? Yes, for the same reasons…even though Tonto is the central character and at least interesting; while, Armie Hammer is just awful as the Lone Ranger who is a bumbling tenderfoot in this remake. Then again, the Comanche are presented heroically and there are Native actors employed — the great Native actor Saginaw Grant is superb as the erudite Chief Big Bear. It’s no Django, either. Tonto never shoots anyone, but the bad guys do end up dead…in the looong run.
There are only two women characters: one plays — the plucky, widow in distress; the other — the plucky, brothel owner…they don’t even share a word of dialogue together. Woeful dialogue throughout. Somehow it got a PG-13 rating despite cannibalism, scalpings, skull crushing, and, of course, genocide. (Keep the kids at home!) It’s just a bad movie.
Best line: when the Lone Ranger tries to stop the Comanche from going to war after they were unjustly attacked. Chief Big Bear demurs and says, “We are already ghosts.”
When at the end, a railroad magnate tries to buy off the Lone Ranger with a gold watch, tells him: “There’s plenty more where that came from. Always nice to have a lawman on the side of progress and industry.” (The LR refuses to take off the mask, gives back the watch box and walks away. You find out later that the watch wasn’t in the box, as Tonto had taken it and traded some birdseed for it.)
So, it had quite the obvious set up for a sequel at the end…but, with 5 people at a 500-seat matinee, I don’t think so. Thank Gaia! Heads are gonna roll at Disney.
MICHAEL DONNELLY is a long-time supporter of the American Indian Movement (AIM). He can be reached at pahtoo@aol.com
Republished with permission from: Counterpunch