Bury My Heart's major mistakes

HBO's 'Wounded Knee' ignites controversy:  Stories altered to fit plotlinesDaniel Giat, who wrote the film's screenplay, said he had tried especially to humanize Sitting Bull, the Lakota chief and holy man, presenting him as somewhat vain and boastful, though wholeheartedly dedicated to his people. Critics say the film went too far, though, and several prominent native figures left an early screening of the film in protest.

"I walked out. Relatives of Sitting Bull won't be happy," said Joseph Brings Plenty, Lakota, chairman of the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe, in an interview with Indian Country Today. "They portrayed him as a cruel man; he was a holy man, he took care of the people."And:The film also employs artistic license heavily with the introduction of Charles Eastman (Ohiyesa in his native Sioux), a physician and reformer. Eastman was a prominent figure in the late-nineteenth century, but did not play an important role in the book version of Bury My Heart. The HBO adaptation, however, made Eastman the main protagonist, including a largely fictionalized internal struggle for the "assimilated" Eastman, whose film representation (played to much acclaim by Saulteaux actor Adam Beach) feared he had abandoned his people by receiving a western education.

Many have found the use of the character Eastman to be an attempt on the part of HBO to provide a sort of buffer between the Native American characters and a largely white audience. Critics, however, have deemed this unnecessary, even offensive, citing acclaimed mini-series "Roots" as rebuttal to the assumption that a white audience needs a "whiter" character to relate.