James Fenimore Cooper Society Website This page is: Jeffrey Walker ( Oklahoma State University) Presented at the 10th Cooper Seminar, James Fenimore Cooper: His Country and His Art at the State University of New York College at Oneonta, July, 1995 ©1999[may be downloaded and reproduced for personal or instructional use, or by libraries] Originally published in James Fenimore Cooper: His Country and His Art ( No. 10 Papers from the 1995 Cooper Seminar ( No. 10 The State University of New York College at Oneonta. Oneonta, New York. Hugh C. Mac Dougall, editor. (pp. 77-84) Return to SUNY Seminars | Articles A Narrative of 1757 has probably generated more attention from Hollywood filmmakers than virtually any other American novel. From its first adaptations in 1909 as a D. W. Griffith one-reeler and in 1911 as two different one-reelers by the Powers and Thanhouser Film Companies to its latest incarnation in 1992 as a Michael Mann potboiler, more than a dozen interpretations of the novel have appeared in various forms, from silent picture to Mascot serial to animated version to BBC television series to Hollywood epic.1 Considering the popular reception of the novel in Coopers day and the mythic story it spins about American frontier heroes, this attention seems deserved. Most Americans, if they have not read the novel (and most have not have nonetheless read about it or read abridged versions of it, and our own popular culture has embraced it in a number of curious ways. Mark Twain made Cooper and his offenses against literary art in the Leather- Stocking tales part of his traveling lecture shows. More recently, the anti-hero of.
I'd like to start the second installment of Motion History by thanking everyone for all their positive feedback! There's no better feeling than knowing people enjoyed reading something as much as you enjoyed writing it, particularly since I feel as though I didn't even give the topic justice! I've had a lot of requests to tackle particular movies. Believe me, I'm making a list, and we'll tackle it together. Your favorite will be coming. With so much enthusiasm, I feel as though this week's selection may let a lot of people down. But I was trying to avoid the personal temptation of picking something medieval, and I was inspired by TCM devoting a month to portrayals of Native Americans on film. I thought I'd chip in with a discussion of Michael Mann's The Last of the Mohicans, a film that walks the weird line between history, stereotype and authenticity. The Film It's 1757, and America is caught in the middle of the French- Indian War. ( The Seven Years War if you're European.) Chingachgook ( Russell Means his son Uncas ( Eric Schweig) and his adopted white son Nathanial Hawkeye Poe ( Daniel Day- Lewis) remain independent of the conflict, though their friendships with British settlers find them aligning with General Webb and the British forces of Fort William Henry. Those British forces include Col. Edward Munro. A widower with two daughters Cora ( Madeleine Stowe) and Alice ( Jodhi May he sends word that he'd like them to come to Fort William Henry. Cora and Alice, eager to see the frontier and all of its wild men, set out, guarded by Magua ( Wes Studi Major Duncan Heyward ( Steven Waddington) and a detachment of English soldiers. strong> But this war – and this is a frontier where European flags don't have a lot of sway over the private and bloody war that the natives are waging on settlers. Magua betrays Cora and Alice, but they're rescued by the impossibly handsome.
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