MOVIE REVIEW : ‘War Party’ Revives a Tragic American Game

The time-honored game of cowboys ‘n’ Indians is revived with self-consciously tragic results in “War Party” (citywide), which, for all its appealing players, tense action and intriguing plot devices, is not the feel-good hit of the fall.

The setup is unique but strangely familiar: In modern-day Wyoming, a small band of youthful Blackfeet is being methodically hunted down in the wilderness for an ill-perceived crime against white men. Those lawmen brave or silly enough to come after them meet extremely violent resistance.

The dilemma facing the befuddled Indian heroes toward the morally ambiguous climax is whether to surrender or to fight to the finish, either way perpetuating centuries of historically gory injustice.

Yes, this is just what it sounds like: “First Blood” meets “Do the Right Thing.”

The Sly-versus-Spike clash of sensibilities is an irresistibly bizarre one, but both those predecessors had queasy resolutions that were felt by many viewers to be troublesome. And terrific as much of the buildup in “War Party” is, you just know there’s no conceivable way the film makers will have come up with a climax worthy of its crescendo. And you’re right.

For its first half or so, though, “War Party” shapes up to be one of the shrewdest, uncanniest, nerviest action pictures of the year.

Director Franc Roddam has worked with small youth ensembles before (“Quadrophenia,” “Lords of Discipline”), and there is telling detail in the way he and writer Spencer Eastman show an Indian community through the eyes of its youth, who sense that their parents have sold their souls to blend in with the white municipality but aren’t quite aware just how much heritage has been shed.

These kids aren’t particularly bright, or brave; like their soon-to-be-mortal-enemy Anglo counterparts in the town, they like to drink and smoke dope and indulge in casual foreplay on horseback.

A prologue portraying the systematic slaughter of an Indian tribe 100 years earlier segues into the arrival of long-haired lead player Sonny Crowkiller (Billy Wirth) in a pickup truck, listening to a rock tape that any young white stoner might have on--a quintessential ‘70s party anthem with Free’s Paul Rodgers singing “Baby, it’s all right now . . . we’re so happy together!”

The irony in that nice touch is subtle but clear, and it’s established early on that, for all the surface assimilation, there’s trouble brewing between the two races that will explode in violence.

The occasion comes when a 100-year-old battle between Indians and settlers is re-enacted to lure tourists during a centennial celebration. (The ease with which the Blackfeet agree to re-create a battle in which their forefathers were wiped out is implausible, but no matter.)

One malcontent drunk decides to shoot-’em-up for real, and before anyone can figure out what happened, violence is begetting violence and history is skipping on its groove, as Wirth and Kevin Dillon and two other Indian males retreat on horseback to the woods, planeloads and truckloads of vigilante locals close behind.

The cross-cutting between hunters and prey is initially nerve-wracking, then drags. The appearance late in the game of a bounty hunter played by M. Emmet Walsh--a character actor who has saved many a movie--promises a pick-me-up, but he actually slows this one down, since his character has so little to do with the plot.

Offering even less of an assist is an alcoholic medicine man who plays much the same Greek-chorus function as the town drunk in Spike Lee’s movie, only far less successfully. And in this case, the final act of doing the right thing seems far more senseless than anything Lee could have concocted on a mind-bendingly hot day.

Roddam and Eastman deserve credit for having the courage of their convictions in not trying to paste a sunny resolution onto their bleak (and justifiably R-rated) story. But while their “War” goes out with a literal bang, it wraps up with a symbolic whimper, one that finally seems to exploit a situation begging to be treated without war-whooping cliches or fatalism.

It’s their “Party,” and they’ll cry if they want to; real-life Indians may be excused for failing to RSVP.

‘WAR PARTY’

A Hemdale presentation. Producers John Daly, Derek Gibson, Bernard Williams. Director Franc Roddam. Script Spencer Eastman. Executive producers Roddam, Chris Chesser. Editor Sean Barton. Music Chaz Jankel. Camera Brian Tufano. With Billy Wirth, Kevin Dillon, Tim Sampson, Jimmie Ray Weeks, Guy Boyd, Jerry Hardin, M. Emmet Walsh, Peggy Lipton.

Running time: 1 hour, 37 minutes.

MPAA-rated: R (under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian).