The Last of the Mohicans (1992)

The most amazing element of this film at IMDb.com is the overwhelming international location from viewer comment response, which means on a human level, this film really hits home, and Michael Mann was obviously swinging for the fences. It is the second widely acclaimed film released--not counting musicals, of course--where the score is as important as the actors, cinematic photography, characters or the story (2001: A Space Odyssey is the first). Set in the West of its historical time period (Hawkeye's isolationist view was that his dad, his bro and he were heading to "kan-tucky" to escape the encroaching modern civilization since you couldn't get any bare bones farther west than that in the human knowledge of the day), this is the first real chase story in literature and Mann makes it so on screen, it starts with them running and finishes with them running; everyone is pursuing something, and few reach their destination without death and violence interrupting their personal chase. The photography belongs in a museum, the music is a symphonic magnet, the acting and sparsely spoken words fit like little pieces of a jigsaw puzzle to create an immaculately magnificent picture. This is right up there with Kubrich's Barry Lyndon as the best film ever photographed for popular release. A solid -10- Must See ...if you watch this, Dances With Wolves, then The Unforgiven and The Wild Bunch, you will have seen a staggering panoramic view of western genre that covers the entire period. As a trivial sidelight, Russell Means(as Chingachkook), who is a true American Indian, and was at the last battle with FBI and government agents at Wounded Knee, once was hired in Ohio during the Bicentennial Celebration, along with Native American buddies of his, to play Indians greeting the Mayflower crew as they landed. As the ship drew close they shot arrows at the landing party and refused to let them ashore (now THAT'S a true revolutionary with the courage and the intelligence to make a point with some great humor--although the folks that hired him in Cleveland weren't laughing much then) so its only appropriate that the moving and eloquent closing speech along the North Carolina skyline at sunset is his.