Comment Hollywood a "whitewashed" l'Ouest Américain

How Hollywood Whitewashed the Old West

Among many other movie genres, westerns are considered to be one of the pillars of the film industry, especially during the twentieth century. It draws its inspiration from a substantial amount of stereotypes related to the essence of America, including the freedom of the frontier and the strong values of the newcomers, eager to tame the wilderness and explore a new land full of riches. However, the cowboy figure in those movies was massively embodied by white actors, whereas it wasn’t the case in reality, as most of them were hispanic. To what extent did new and more recent Westerns help dispel the white-cowboy myth?

To begin with, cowboy culture refers to a particular style of ranching introduced in North America by Spanish colonists during the 16th century, when the vast majority of ranch owners were Spanish and when handymen were Native Americans. By the late 19th century roughly one in three cowboys was Mexican, and the recognizable cowboy features such as bandanas, hats and lassos were all invented by “latinos”. Therefore, the expression “cultural appropriation” seems to precisely describe the white appropriation of the western genre.

Moreover, other ethnicities were underrepresented in the Western genre, even though they played an important role in the conquest westward. the frontier was also populated by roughly 20,000 Chinese immigrants who contributed significantly to the development of the West, including the construction of the first Transcontinental Railroad. Moreover, Anglo-colonists brought African slaves into the area in the early 1800s, so the latter widely contributed to the inception of the Wild West, but are still fighting for recognition.

In fact, during the 1950’s (the golden era of western movies), the protagonists were all white, and colored actors (which were rare) played as the antagonists, with names like Mexican Henchman or Facetious Redskin. Other races were misrepresented, intentionally or not, and were considered as “extras”. Over the next few decades, Hollywood eventually casted black cowboys in Westerns such as Lonesome Dove (1989) or Unforgiven (1992), but were criticized as they were considered as “too politically correct”.

More recent films such as The Hateful Eight or Django Unchained by Quentin Tarantino can be considered as revisionist, but the plot still seems to be lead by the white hero, who guides the colored protagonist, depicting a “white-savior” scheme. But films such as The Revenant (2015) by the Mexican director Alejandro González Iñárritu were made with remarkable realism, as the Native characters were played by Native actors and as the film also featured black characters. The Magnificent seven, too, was praised for its “rainbow coalition” cast, but these characters were however treated as tokens, and were only here “for the show”.

In conclusion, it seems that Hollywood has evolved since the Western’s golden era when it comes to representing colored people, but that some progress could still be made. However, as Denzel Washington highlighted, movies are made in order to have a good time and to escape, so this problem shouldn’t be considered as “too deep”. However, this new awareness may prompt more viewers to eventually see the all-white West for what it is: fiction.

...