News of the World
starring Tom Hanks and Helena Zengel
screenplay by Paul Greengrass and Luke Davies
directed by Paul Greengrass
Rating: ♦♦♦♦♦
Based on the novel News of the World by Paulette Jiles (Harper-Collins, 2016), the film is an American western drama that follows a Confederate Civil War veteran (Captain Jefferson Kyle Kidd, played by Hanks) who must return a young girl who was taken in by Native Americans as a little girl to her last remaining family (Johanna Leonberger, played by 12-year-old German actress Helena Zengel). It’s another interesting look at the American West, especially the post-Civil War west, how former Confederate soldiers fared in Reconstructionist America. When we think of Reconstruction, we usually think of the South, the heart of the Confederacy. We usually don’t think of the West, despite knowing that restless, itinerant Confederate veterans made up a considerable proportion of the outlaws, scoundrels and scofflaws for which the West was famous.
Captain Kidd makes his living traveling from town to town reading the news to interested paying audiences across the frontier. It seems like random stories from a collection of print newspapers, but in reality, Capt. Kidd cleverly tailors his selections for effect, for his audiences. He uses local saloons as his stage. I’d never imagined such a profession, but … It’s an interesting picture of American settlers that I never considered before: people who were interested in politics and policy, interested in what was happening in other parts of their country and the world, people who were interested in reading and knowledge. The film presents it as a kind of entertainment, like going to the movies today.
In the course of his wanderings, he comes across a young Caucasian girl who speaks no English, but only the Native American Kiowa language. I know it was rare, but it certainly did happen, that white children sometimes were abducted by some American indigenous tribes and raised I those tribes. In Johanna’s case, she had no memory of her immigrant German family and language. She was just a Kiowa girl, named Cicada.
Captain Kidd delivers the child to the nearest Bureau of Indian Affairs office, but is told that the best thing is for him to deliver the girl to her nearest confirmed relatives, by himself. That requires a long trip through relatively lawless land, with peril behind every tree. Eventually, the two bond, and Captain Kidd becomes Johann’s adoptive father. It’s a multi-cultural bonding exercise, involving white American, Native American, and German American elements.
News of the World is good enough to watch again.