River Queen (2005, Vincent Ward)
Reminds me a bit of Dances with Wolves.
An Irish (already a subjugated people) woman, Sarah, has a child with a Maori which is taken by its Maori grandfather when Sarah's father tries to clear a Maori sacred site. She searches for him in vain until a native tracker, the brother of her child's father and also spy for the other side, reintroduces her to him in return for her healing the chief of the native resistance. When she does this, the chief makes her (or at least calls her) a queen.
Her son will not go back to become a European, and, after much to do and the death of the character Private Doyle (who recognizes that the "Maori are just like the Irish" but with darker skin), she decides that it is more important to be a family with her boy and his uncle than be European alone. She melts in to the surrounding community with her family , and they survive and thrive through the rest of the Maori wars.
The visuals are great, the story is fairly familiar.
The director's Q&A was rather informative. In the Maori wars, the Maori were able to fight so long despite being out manned and out gunned because they were tenacious fighters, brilliant strategists, and had more advanced arms provided by American whalers.
the film's story is loosely inspired by a few real stories. A man's daughter was taken for his having put a road through sacred land, and, when she was later found, she had forgotten ever being European. A Red Cross nurse treated Maori on the other side and kept it secret for 20 years because it was a treasonous act. From the further commentary by the director, it seems much of the Maori chief's actions in the film were based on stories of the old chiefs.
Le Samourai (1967, Jean-Pierre Melville)
From what I hear, this isn't a bad introduction to Melville.
It definitely has a French New Wave feel to it with the handheld cameras at certain times. Alain Delon's virtually silent assassin is good, as is the entire film.
The assassin kills a man, is picked up by the police, but he has constructed a good alibi. His employers try to kill him as the police keep after him for the murder. He kills the head of the contracting organization, then sets himself up to be killed rather than fulfill his last contract.
This is supposedly the inspiration behind Ghost Dog and The Professional among others.
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