Little Big Man Message Board
Ezekiel Zeke Steiner posts a message on 11/2/2005 3:55:43 PM
As Old Lodge Skins, the Cheyenne chief in Little Big Man, says of the white man who massacres Indians, they “do not seem to know where the center of the earth is” and consequently their viciousness comes from being forced to live their lives in squares and straight lines. Penn's characters are basically good, though inarticulate, people who can't understand the artificial world that imprisons them. They are further hindered in coping with that world because they experience life physically, through intuition and feeling, rather than through analytic thought. Thus, unaware of their own needs and unable to express them freely in a society that doesn't value spontaneity and honest emotion, they are forced to communicate in the only way left to them – violently.
Note: the views expressed here are only those of the posters.
