Product Description

One of the last great leaders of the Native American Resistance, Sitting Bull earned his place in history with his stunning victory in the Battle at Little Bighorn-but his life encompassed much more than one battle. BIOGRAPHY® journeys back to the fading days of the Old West for a comprehensive history of the Sioux medicine man. Hear period accounts that narrate his many battles with early settlers and learn how he revised the Native American strategy and created more effective fighters. Discover how he masterminded the victory at Custer's Last Stand and trace the tragic last days of his life, from his position in Buffalo Bill's "Wild West Show" to his captivity and death. SITTING BULL: CHIEF OF THE LAKOTA NATION presents a moving and remarkable portrait of one of the last great Native American warriors. DVD Features: Interactive Menus; Scene Selection

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #36619 in DVD
• Brand: A&E
• Released on: 2005-12-27
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 50 minutes

Customer Reviews

A Lakota Leader
This documentary taught me some important stuff. The Lakota called whites "longhairs": I would have thought they would think of them as "shorthairs" compared to their long braids. It turns out that Sitting Bull did not participate in Custer's Last Stand; he just foresaw it in a vision. The Lakota thought gold was useless; I thought gold's shininess appealed to all humans, thus its value, even in Ancient Egypt.
One big problem is that this documentary begins by focusing on Lakota culture and Red Elk and ends by describing a massacre that took place after Sitting Bull's assassination. Thus, little of this work focuses specifically on Sitting Bull.
The documentary says, "The Lakota were tolerant of alternative lifestyles" and then it describes acts of masochism (that one interviewee incorrectly calls sadism) during Sun Dances. However, in Walter L. Williams' "The Spirit and the Flesh: Sexual Diversity in American Indian Cultures," an ancestor of Sitting Bull said she thinks he had a two-spirited, or transgendered, wife. Thus, Sitting Bull may have been what we would now call bisexual, yet the documentary never brings that up.
This A&E work must have been made at the same time as their work on Crazy Horse. Understandably, Crazy Horse avoided the Western practice of photography. However, since Sitting Bull didn't oppose it, we have all these varied, descriptive photos of him to this day. The same white interviewees in the Crazy Horse work were interviewed here, but the Native American interviewees were different people.

Sitting Bull Rules!!
Disregard that last review,Sitting Bull Rules in this A&E Biography.It's a must see!!

Poor History
This video biography is a departure from the normally well-done A & E series. It has very little to commend it, offering nothing new and making several grievous historical errors, especially in the closing narration. Poor history and even poorer biography.