It added elements of drama and tragedy that were out-of-place in a mostly fun and funny movie.
(This is not a movie for children, so parents do heed the PG-13 rating.) The movie, which runs two and a half hours, would have done better by excluding this subplot. Indeed, it is the Indians who are framed and brutalized by an evil robber baron in league with a mechanized U.S. The movie works self-consciously and a little too hard to overturn the old Hollywood stereotype of villainous Indians. Unfortunately, in what seems to be a failed attempt at authenticity, he refers to Cavendish as a “wendigo.” That is a mythological creature in a number of northern woodlands cultures, but not a part of Comanche culture. Tonto believes the villain is a supernaturally evil creature that can only be destroyed by a silver bullet. He believes his destiny is to hunt and kill men like bad-guy Butch Cavendish. There is also a dark side to his madness. Rather, it is a manifestation of Tonto’s madness. So Tonto’s weird dead-bird headdress, which has generated much discussion among Indian cultural critics, is not presented as traditional Indian dress. We learn from the plot that his eccentricity is actually a mostly good-natured madness arising from a childhood trauma.
Depp’s Tonto is understood by all-especially the Comanches in the movie-to be a very strange man. All of the Indian characters-except Tonto, of course-are played by Indian actors. Most of the Indians in the movie are articulate and thoroughly aware of their circumstances. Fortunately, “The Lone Ranger” does little harm in this regard, in my opinion. Still, many of us were concerned that the movie would just be one more exercise in stereotyping Indians.
Depp himself was embraced by certain Indian tribes and organizations, was even “adopted” into the Comanche Nation, and appeared at a special premiere for Comanche citizens in Lawton, Oklahoma. It sponsored a thousand-dollar-a-ticket gala premiere, with the proceeds going to the American Indian College Fund. To show its bona fides, Disney actively sought tribal support for the project. Much of our work at the National Museum of the American Indian is to challenge the misinformation and stereotyping about Indians to which the entire world has been subjected. Along with the degrading practice of making Indians mascots for sports teams, Hollywood’s portrayals of Indians have created in the minds of much of the American public a thorough misunderstanding of how Indians were in the 18th and 19th centuries and how they are now. The Indians we have seen in the movies have largely been dim, hostile and violent. Hollywood, after all, has been a leader in stereotyping and demeaning Indians. Depp’s Tonto, they said, would be the star of the movie, a character who would make Indians proud. Depp’s Tonto, they said, would not be simply the “faithful Indian companion” to the title character.
Both Disney and Johnny Depp, the star of the movie, had promised to remake Tonto, the iconic Indian from the television series of the 1950s. Had he not, it was coming straight down into the head." Fortunately, the horse just barely clipped Johnny Depp with his back legs, so Depp just wound up a little store, rather than experiencing life-threatening injuries.I admit that I went to see “ The Lone Ranger” expecting to be disappointed and quite likely offended by the portrayal of Indians in the movie. Depp added, "The one thing that saved me was the horse's instinct to lift his front legs and go over me….stepped over me. Johnny Depp told Letterman that he landed on his back. A surprised Letterman said, "You really could have been seriously, seriously injured if not killed." Depp agreed, "Horrifically mangled at the very least." However, Johnny Depp had to make a decision to go with the beast until someone wrangled it or to drop, and he chose to drop. Johnny Depp managed to grab the reins and the mane of the horse to stay on. Depp said, "When we came down, the saddle slipped, and I went to the left." The saddle that Johnny Depp was using was jerry-rigged to give the effect that he was riding bareback, so it wasn't tight on the horse. While they were shooting scenes in the desert where there were a bunch of bumps, Johnny Depp's horse decided to jump some of the obstacles. They weren't really interested in slowing down at all." The horses had been running, we'd been running them all day. In talking about riding horses at top speed, Johnny Depp said, "There was one moment in particular where it got unpleasant. As one would expect, Johnny Depp's role as Tonto required him to do a lot of horseback riding. In an appearance on The Late Show With David Letterman on Thursday night, Johnny Depp relayed a story about nearly getting killed on the set of The Lone Ranger.