The film continu...ummmm

I would consider Last of the Mohicans, on the film continuum, to be slightly between classicism and realism, definitely favoring the classical side, however. In other words this film is almost totally in the realm of classicism with a touch of realism. This film does avoid the extremes of both formalism and realism. The director, Michael Mann most definitely does not attempt to tell the story objectively. Clearly, beginning in the words of the novel and then translating to what is seen on screen, the story favors Hawkeye’s (Daniel Day Louis) and the Mohicans point of view. Magua (Wes Studi) is painted, literally and figuratively, as a barbaric, blood-hungry character. The only part of the film that could make him seem civilized is when he reaches his hand out to Alice Munro (Jodhi May). This could be all well and good, but then we see the blood of Uncas, her love interest, drip of off Magua’s knuckles. Defining this film by the parameters given is difficult and constraining. For example classical films have been described as being handsomely made, but the style does not call attention to itself. Mann does a beautiful job of directing, making the film very aesthetically pleasing. Because of this, the style not only calls attention to itself, it screams out to the audience. For example, when the British are marching from their recently surrendered fort, they are filmed with a subjective camera angle from Magua’s point of view. There is sparse, if not any at all, diegetic sound during this sequence prior to the Huron’s attack. Mann is quite blatantly expressing the proverbial calm before the storm. Without debate, this is a stunningly shot scene. Due to this, however, the film and its style do call attention to themselves. This film is classical almost by default. It is not distorted like a formalistic film. It is not an objective film focusing wholly on content like a film out of the school of realism. It is stylized and “handsomely” presented and that is why Last of the Mohicans is a classical film.