‘American Primeval’ series review: A beautiful, brutal perspective

A still from ‘American Primeval’ 
| Photo Credit: @Netflix/YouTube

In the first few minutes of Episode 1 of American Primeval, a man is suddenly shot dead. Sara (Betty Gilpin), who is travelling with her son, Devin (Preston Mota), reaches Fort Bridger, a trading post in Wyoming. She is supposed to meet a guide who will take her to Crooks Springs and Devin’s father. The man who brings her to Fort Bridger is the one who is shot. That opening scene with the restless camera and overlaying voices, Sara’s insistence on going to Crooks Springs despite Fort Bridger’s founder and chief, Jim (Shea Whigham), telling her the unchartered territory is dangerous, and the sudden death of their guide sets the tone for the rest of this meticulously researched and mounted mini-series.

In Fort Bridger, we meet the main characters of the ensuing drama. Apart from Sara and Devin, there is James Wolsey (Joe Tippett), who leads a militant wing of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon Church). Jacob, (Dane DeHaan) a devout Mormon, is travelling with his wife, Abish, (Saura Lightfoot-Leon) to the Zion promised by the Mormon governor of Utah, Brigham Young (Kim Coates).  

Virgil (Jai Courtney) hears of the $1500 bounty on Sara and doggedly pursues her with a band of trappers. Two Moons (Shawnee Pourier), is a Native American woman, who flees a life of abuse and hitches her star to Sara’s wagon. Isaac Reed (Taylor Kitsch) a skilled tracker, thanks to being brought up by the Shoshone, at first refuses to take Sara and Devin to Crooks Springs. He later relents to his everlasting sorrow and joy.

Red Feather (Derek Hinkey), the fierce warrior and leader of the Wolf Clan, does not wish to follow his mother, Winter Bird’s (Irene Bedard) policy of moving out of the White people’s path. He would rather stay and fight as he believes they cannot outrun the colonisers. He also wants to protect his son, Young Elk’s (Mosiah Aaron Crowfoot) inheritance.

Set around the Utah War of 1857, American Primeval is a stark portrayal of the bloody battles fought to birth a nation. The West is a tinderbox fuelled by suspicion, fatigue and war-mongering. The Native Americans are being squeezed out of their lands by both the US government and the Mormons. The LDS Church wishes to set up its own government where they can live by their laws, a policy, which the US government naturally looks at with suspicion.

Sara and Devin join Jacob, Abish and settlers from Arkansas on their way to California on the Old Spanish Trail. An altercation with Mormon militia results in a massacre by hooded Mormons and the Paiute. The Mountain Meadows Massacre finds the principals scattered. Sara, Devin, Two Moons and Isaac flee from Virgil. The Shoshone take Abish while Jacob though grievously wounded, continues to search for her. Wolsey wants to ensure there are no witnesses to reveal the Mormons’ part in the massacre.   

Captain Edmund Dellinger (Lucas Neff), a US Army officer, does not readily believe the Native Americans are responsible for the massacre and the deeper he investigates, the more holes and inconsistencies he finds.

The camera in American Primeval is as much a storyteller as the actors. Jacques Jouffret’s frames pulse with life and nature, red in tooth and claw. There is a section of the Mountain Meadows Massacre from Sara’s perspective, where she hides under a cart with Devin as arrows and bullets fly around her. Punctuated with war cries and the screams of dying people, the section is a kinetic masterpiece of visual storytelling.  

There are the still frames as well — whether it is the inexorable fall of silent snow, the long shot of Jacob sitting under a tree with the ugly stitches of his almost-scalping burnished in the sun, or Red Feather atop a hill, which convey much more than sound and fury. Though Gilpin is riveting as Sara, it is the secondary characters one is drawn to; from Whigham’s practical Bridger and Coates’ mesmeric Young to DeHaan’s hopelessly devoted Jacob and Lightfoot-Leon’s Abish who is “not ready to be found.” 

The melodramatic sixth episode was a bit of a letdown, veering into masala film territory, but otherwise American Primeval delivers on all counts with thrills, tears and terror in a breathtakingly beautiful landscape.   

American Primeval is currently streaming on Netflix