Texas Rising
Texas Rising : History Channel
The Searchers Meet Gone With the Wind
by Paulette Reynolds
July 10, 2015
Directed by Roland Joffé
Starring Bill Paxton, Olivier Martinez, Ray Liotta, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Jeremy Davies, Cynthia Addai-Robinson, Jeff Fahey, Crispin Glover, Thomas Jane, Rob Morrow, Kris Kristofferson, Brendan Fraser and a cast of - well, you get the idea.
Basking in their Vikings TV series glow, The History Channel delivers Texas Rising, a miniseries about the events leading up to the Texas revolution, beginning at the defeat of the Alamo in 1836. This quasi-historical effort includes notable political leaders, the Texas Rangers, and a supporting cast of fictionalized characters woven into the crazy-quilt that is the great state of Texas history.
Events begin at the seige and bloody massacre of the Alamo, where the beloved Sam Huston hesitates to join and the hated General Santa Anna takes advantage of this inaction. Great storylines follow well-known fighters in both the Army and Texas Rangers, lead by Deef Smith and your usual odd assortment of characters that attach themselves to epic moments in history.
The main weakness of Texas Rising lies in the fictionalized thread of early Texicana history. These parallel stories involve people - the men and women, families and farmers, and just plain folks who battled both ruthless Mexican soldiers and angry, hostile Indians.
It's sadly worth noting that ALL Native Americans are depicted as obsessive savages, straight out of John Wayne's The Searchers, wielding tomahawks into children and shooting arrows at helpless settlers and their families. The thankless task of portraying the ONLY kindly Native American went to Brendan Fraser, who plays Billy Anderson, a white assimilated version of a Native American (shades of Rachel Dolezal!).
Unfortunately, most of the victims didn't get the memo about the token Texas Ranger passing as Native American - after all, they're too busy trying to escape the stereotyped war-painted savages or being killed off by roaming bands of Santa Anna's Army. And Billy's presence doesn't help the peaceful Tejano families, either, as they try to duck and dodge Lorca - one crazy blood-thirsty white guy (Ray Liotta) whose sworn mission was to "kill Mexicans" - and this guy doesn't discriminate against soldiers or Tejanos - as he's literally skinning them or gunning them down in front of their children.
When the show strays from historical fact, you get scenes like Nate, the family slave who's a big, slow black guy, worriedly moaning that he doesn't want his mistress to set him free. In a scene straight out of Gone with the Wind, Nate pleads, "Miss Pauline, have I done you wrong? Why you free me, where I'm going to go?" He's absolutely overjoyed to find out that it's all an act to keep him safely on the homestead and out of the clutches of an unscrupulous deed merchant. I really thought those moments were ground into the dust of Hollywood's racist history garbage bin...sigh. Apparently not.
And it's an old Hollywood adage - borrowed from Samuel Taylor Coleridge - that the viewer of art is supposed to "suspend disbelief" when faced with unrealistic perspectives or information. This action on our part allows the creative artiste to spin the visual dreams that we so enjoy, especially for fictionalized material. The sticky point here is that interjecting too much fiction in a historically-based story produces a revisionist brand of history that often passes for historical truth. What was the point in reverting back to 1940s/1950s Hollywood-style treatment of black and Native Americans? Was it so hard for The History Channel to deliver actual history, while using a story that didn't pander to racism and gender stereotypes?
But The History Channel had plenty of help, thanks to director Roland Joffe and the writers, especially when perpetrating the enduring Texas mythology of Emily West, aka The Yellow Rose of Texas. Cynthia Addai-Robinson struggles to bring a nobler sense of purpose to a role that depicts this fictional character as little more than a smooth-talking sex kitten. West is relegated to bedding down the two major stars, sorrowful Sam Houston (Bill Paxton) and arrogant Santa Anna (Olivier Martinez). Talk about suspension of disbelief!
Let's keep in mind that Emily West was a vague footnote whose legend grew, until everyone though she was a spy for the growing Republic, while getting friendly with Santa Anna (or was it Sam Houston?). The famous song referring to her beauty, "The Yellow Rose of Texas", went through several revisions to aid in the historical collusion. In its original, documented form, this song was little more than a sweet love ballad from Christy's Plantation Melodies. No. 2, circa 1853. * Yet the revised version went far in romanticizing an unknown woman into a legend that is still hotly debated among historians and scholars alike.
Even though writers Leslie Greif, Darrell Fetty, and George Nihil played fast and loose with fiction posing as historical truth, they did manage to inject some much-needed romance - and cutting-edge western designer fashions - into this 10-hour miniseries of guns, testosterone, and long speeches about "fightin' for liberty".
The real disbelief here lies in the sloppy approach to history that The History Channel took. Rather than taking archival evidence from observers, eye-witnesses and participants like Lydia Ann McHenry or Suzanna Dickinson, they sought to scrape by with the usual tired historical footnotes and stick to lovingly crafted fabrication. Texans McHenry wrote observations to her brother and Dickinson actually survived the battle of the Alamo - and spoke directly with Santa Anna, Houston, and Deef Smith. Well, Hollywood screenwriters have never been known to think outside of the box.
The strongest thread in this miniseries is the interplay between the Texas Rangers - their bonds of friendships, forged in the fire of battle and blood and sacrifice. Enjoy Texas Rising for that - and Ray Liotta's fantastic Emmy-worthy performance - but realize you'll be kept busy suspending that disbelief for 10 hours - and that partner, is a hell of a lot of popcorn.
* Original version of The Yellow Rose of Texas, from Christy's Plantation Melodies. No. 2:
There's a yellow girl in Texas
That I'm going down to see;
No other darkies know her
No darkey, only me;
She cried so when I left her
That it like to broke my heart,
And if I only find her,
we never more will part.
Chorus:
She's the sweetest girl of colour
That this darkey ever knew;
Her eyes are bright as diamonds,
And sparkle like the dew.
You may talk about your Dearest Mae,
And sing of Rosa Lee,
But the yellow Rose of Texas
Beats the belles of Tennessee .
Where the Rio Grande is flowing,
And the starry skies are bright,
Oh, she walks along the river
In the quiet summer night;
And she thinks if I remember
When we parted long ago,
I promised to come back again,
And not to leave her so.
[Repeat chorus]
Oh, I'm going now to find her,
For my heart is full of woe,
And we'll sing the songs together
That we sang so long ago.
We'll play the banjo gaily,
And we'll sing our sorrows o'er,
And the yellow Rose of Texas
shall be mine forever more.
[Chorus]
"Dearest Mae" and "Rosa Lee" referenced are the titles of two other songs that appeared in Christy's Minstrels songbooks. The earliest known version is found in Christy's Plantation Melodies. No. 2, a songbook published under the authority of Edwin Pearce Christy in Philadelphia in 1853. Christy was the founder of the blackface minstrel show known as the Christy's Minstrels.
References:
Douglas Brode, "The Yellow Rose of Texas: A Growing Legend" http://www.historynet.com/the-yellow-rose-of-texas-a-growing-legend.htm . 2/3/2011. July 6, 2015.
Margaret Swett Henson, "WEST, EMILY D.," Handbook of Texas Online (http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fwe41), accessed June 15, 2015. Uploaded on June 15, 2010. Modified on June 1, 2015. Published by the Texas State Historical Association.
George R. Nielsen. Lydia Ann McHenry and Revolutionary Texas. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly. Vol 74, No.3, Jan, 1971, pp. 393-408. July 8, 2015.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/30236655?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Yellow_Rose_of_Texas_(song)
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Susanna_Dickinson
The Searchers Meet Gone With the Wind
by Paulette Reynolds
July 10, 2015
Directed by Roland Joffé
Starring Bill Paxton, Olivier Martinez, Ray Liotta, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Jeremy Davies, Cynthia Addai-Robinson, Jeff Fahey, Crispin Glover, Thomas Jane, Rob Morrow, Kris Kristofferson, Brendan Fraser and a cast of - well, you get the idea.
Basking in their Vikings TV series glow, The History Channel delivers Texas Rising, a miniseries about the events leading up to the Texas revolution, beginning at the defeat of the Alamo in 1836. This quasi-historical effort includes notable political leaders, the Texas Rangers, and a supporting cast of fictionalized characters woven into the crazy-quilt that is the great state of Texas history.
Events begin at the seige and bloody massacre of the Alamo, where the beloved Sam Huston hesitates to join and the hated General Santa Anna takes advantage of this inaction. Great storylines follow well-known fighters in both the Army and Texas Rangers, lead by Deef Smith and your usual odd assortment of characters that attach themselves to epic moments in history.
The main weakness of Texas Rising lies in the fictionalized thread of early Texicana history. These parallel stories involve people - the men and women, families and farmers, and just plain folks who battled both ruthless Mexican soldiers and angry, hostile Indians.
It's sadly worth noting that ALL Native Americans are depicted as obsessive savages, straight out of John Wayne's The Searchers, wielding tomahawks into children and shooting arrows at helpless settlers and their families. The thankless task of portraying the ONLY kindly Native American went to Brendan Fraser, who plays Billy Anderson, a white assimilated version of a Native American (shades of Rachel Dolezal!).
Unfortunately, most of the victims didn't get the memo about the token Texas Ranger passing as Native American - after all, they're too busy trying to escape the stereotyped war-painted savages or being killed off by roaming bands of Santa Anna's Army. And Billy's presence doesn't help the peaceful Tejano families, either, as they try to duck and dodge Lorca - one crazy blood-thirsty white guy (Ray Liotta) whose sworn mission was to "kill Mexicans" - and this guy doesn't discriminate against soldiers or Tejanos - as he's literally skinning them or gunning them down in front of their children.
When the show strays from historical fact, you get scenes like Nate, the family slave who's a big, slow black guy, worriedly moaning that he doesn't want his mistress to set him free. In a scene straight out of Gone with the Wind, Nate pleads, "Miss Pauline, have I done you wrong? Why you free me, where I'm going to go?" He's absolutely overjoyed to find out that it's all an act to keep him safely on the homestead and out of the clutches of an unscrupulous deed merchant. I really thought those moments were ground into the dust of Hollywood's racist history garbage bin...sigh. Apparently not.
And it's an old Hollywood adage - borrowed from Samuel Taylor Coleridge - that the viewer of art is supposed to "suspend disbelief" when faced with unrealistic perspectives or information. This action on our part allows the creative artiste to spin the visual dreams that we so enjoy, especially for fictionalized material. The sticky point here is that interjecting too much fiction in a historically-based story produces a revisionist brand of history that often passes for historical truth. What was the point in reverting back to 1940s/1950s Hollywood-style treatment of black and Native Americans? Was it so hard for The History Channel to deliver actual history, while using a story that didn't pander to racism and gender stereotypes?
But The History Channel had plenty of help, thanks to director Roland Joffe and the writers, especially when perpetrating the enduring Texas mythology of Emily West, aka The Yellow Rose of Texas. Cynthia Addai-Robinson struggles to bring a nobler sense of purpose to a role that depicts this fictional character as little more than a smooth-talking sex kitten. West is relegated to bedding down the two major stars, sorrowful Sam Houston (Bill Paxton) and arrogant Santa Anna (Olivier Martinez). Talk about suspension of disbelief!
Let's keep in mind that Emily West was a vague footnote whose legend grew, until everyone though she was a spy for the growing Republic, while getting friendly with Santa Anna (or was it Sam Houston?). The famous song referring to her beauty, "The Yellow Rose of Texas", went through several revisions to aid in the historical collusion. In its original, documented form, this song was little more than a sweet love ballad from Christy's Plantation Melodies. No. 2, circa 1853. * Yet the revised version went far in romanticizing an unknown woman into a legend that is still hotly debated among historians and scholars alike.
Even though writers Leslie Greif, Darrell Fetty, and George Nihil played fast and loose with fiction posing as historical truth, they did manage to inject some much-needed romance - and cutting-edge western designer fashions - into this 10-hour miniseries of guns, testosterone, and long speeches about "fightin' for liberty".
The real disbelief here lies in the sloppy approach to history that The History Channel took. Rather than taking archival evidence from observers, eye-witnesses and participants like Lydia Ann McHenry or Suzanna Dickinson, they sought to scrape by with the usual tired historical footnotes and stick to lovingly crafted fabrication. Texans McHenry wrote observations to her brother and Dickinson actually survived the battle of the Alamo - and spoke directly with Santa Anna, Houston, and Deef Smith. Well, Hollywood screenwriters have never been known to think outside of the box.
The strongest thread in this miniseries is the interplay between the Texas Rangers - their bonds of friendships, forged in the fire of battle and blood and sacrifice. Enjoy Texas Rising for that - and Ray Liotta's fantastic Emmy-worthy performance - but realize you'll be kept busy suspending that disbelief for 10 hours - and that partner, is a hell of a lot of popcorn.
* Original version of The Yellow Rose of Texas, from Christy's Plantation Melodies. No. 2:
There's a yellow girl in Texas
That I'm going down to see;
No other darkies know her
No darkey, only me;
She cried so when I left her
That it like to broke my heart,
And if I only find her,
we never more will part.
Chorus:
She's the sweetest girl of colour
That this darkey ever knew;
Her eyes are bright as diamonds,
And sparkle like the dew.
You may talk about your Dearest Mae,
And sing of Rosa Lee,
But the yellow Rose of Texas
Beats the belles of Tennessee .
Where the Rio Grande is flowing,
And the starry skies are bright,
Oh, she walks along the river
In the quiet summer night;
And she thinks if I remember
When we parted long ago,
I promised to come back again,
And not to leave her so.
[Repeat chorus]
Oh, I'm going now to find her,
For my heart is full of woe,
And we'll sing the songs together
That we sang so long ago.
We'll play the banjo gaily,
And we'll sing our sorrows o'er,
And the yellow Rose of Texas
shall be mine forever more.
[Chorus]
"Dearest Mae" and "Rosa Lee" referenced are the titles of two other songs that appeared in Christy's Minstrels songbooks. The earliest known version is found in Christy's Plantation Melodies. No. 2, a songbook published under the authority of Edwin Pearce Christy in Philadelphia in 1853. Christy was the founder of the blackface minstrel show known as the Christy's Minstrels.
References:
Douglas Brode, "The Yellow Rose of Texas: A Growing Legend" http://www.historynet.com/the-yellow-rose-of-texas-a-growing-legend.htm . 2/3/2011. July 6, 2015.
Margaret Swett Henson, "WEST, EMILY D.," Handbook of Texas Online (http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fwe41), accessed June 15, 2015. Uploaded on June 15, 2010. Modified on June 1, 2015. Published by the Texas State Historical Association.
George R. Nielsen. Lydia Ann McHenry and Revolutionary Texas. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly. Vol 74, No.3, Jan, 1971, pp. 393-408. July 8, 2015.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/30236655?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Yellow_Rose_of_Texas_(song)
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Susanna_Dickinson
COPYRIGHT 2012/2015. Paulette Reynolds. All CineMata Movie Madness blog articles, reviews, faux interviews, commentary, and the Cine Mata character are under the sole ownership of Paulette Reynolds. All intellectual and creative rights reserved.
