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Chief Robert Two Eagles Green of the Patawomeck tribe of Stafford portrays one of his ancestors in 'The New World,' |
By MICHAEL ZITZ
Patawomeck Indian chief Robert Two Eagles Green says "The New World" story of Pocahontas, which opens in theaters in New York and Los Angeles today, uses some artistic license.
For example, the movie has Pocahontas being traded to the English for a copper kettle by the Patawomecks of Stafford County--a detail that's highly doubtful, but makes for smoother storytelling.
The film stars Colin Ferrell as Capt. John Smith and Q'Orianka Kilcher as Pocahontas. Christopher Plummer and Christian Bale also have major roles in the artsy, 21/2-hour New Line Cinema film that features breathtaking panoramic views and little dialogue. It was filmed near Williamsburg.
Green, who was an adviser to the filmmakers and has a non-speaking role, says that although some historians believe the insulting copper kettle story, it's probably not the way things happened.
Much of what is widely believed about Pocahontas is derived from Smith's own dubious and self-glorifying 1624 "Generall Historie of Virginia." Green said diaries written by Smith made no mention of a rescue by Pocahontas.
Green and some historians suspect Smith may have concocted, or greatly exaggerated, the story of Pocahontas' "rescuing" him to make himself a celebrity in England.
The 58-year-old Green, a Clearview Heights resident and White Oak native, said Smith may have known about a common Patawomeck ceremony and inserted himself into it in a fictional account.
"It could have been an adoption ceremony in which you're 'saved from death' and adopted into the tribe--and [director] Terrence Malick kind of plays on that a little bit in the movie," Green said.
Historians say Smith had a big ego and was such a difficult personality that adversaries had jailed him by the time the Susan Constant, Godspeed and Discovery reached Virginia's shores.
"He was in chains when the ship landed, and arrested again at Jamestown," Green said, for insubordination. "He stayed in trouble the whole time he was here."
Six years after Jamestown was founded in 1607, Pocahontas was about 16 or 17 years old. At that time, she visited the Patawomeck tribe on Marlborough Point in Stafford at the mouth of Potomac Creek.
The site, on Indian Point, was one of two Patawomeck settlements--the other was at Passapatanzy in King George County.
Green said Pocahontas' mother was a member of the Patawomeck tribe and she had relatives in Stafford. He said her father, Chief Powhatan, had a wife in every village.
Pocahontas was taken prisoner by the English Capt. Samuel Argall at Passapatanzy and was held hostage at Jamestown for over a year.
Japazaws, the "lower" chief of the Patawomecks, betrayed Pocahontas, tricking her into boarding an English ship in 1613--not for a copper kettle but for protection, Green said. The English had allied themselves with Japazaws and helped provide the Stafford tribe with security, he said.
Part of the area in Stafford that had been Patawomeck land is now named for Japazaws.
Green, in real life a corporate trainer for an insurance company, plays a Powhatan counselor, and his 26-year-old son Jason also appears in the movie as a Powhatan warrior.
"Argall and the English had formed this relationship with Japazaws and they were seeking every advantage they could," Green said. He said the English helped defend the Patawomecks from attack by the Susquehanna tribe.
"Argall told Japazaws, 'If you don't give her to us, we won't think of you of as our friends any more or defend you,'" Green said. "He had a choice of defending this one girl or his whole tribe. It was a mutual defense pact--a very difficult decision."
Green said some historians believe Powhatan was aware of all this and allowed his daughter to be traded "as a final defense to save his people."
The Passapatanzy village Pocahontas was taken from, Green said, is now underwater.
At the time of Smith's supposed "rescue," Pocahontas was not the ripe, beguiling young woman portrayed in films. Historians believe she was probably only 10 or 12 years old when Smith was captured.
Pocahontas was ultimately taken to England and used as a pawn to promote the colony, Green said. She died during a return trip to Virginia in 1617, at age 21.
Green said that despite the distortions of the truth, there's no question that Pocahontas saved the Jamestown colony by convincing the Patawomecks to sell the colonists food.
"Had Argall not gotten the food from the Patawomecks, they would have starved--colony records clearly show that," Green said.
"The film is obviously not a documentary," he said. "It's Terrence Malick's vision of the story.
"It's not factually accurate, but when we raised those issues, they said, 'Remember, this is not a documentary, this is a Hollywood story.'"
However, Green said the way the Indian tribes, including the Patawomecks, are represented is painstakingly accurate.
He's particularly pleased with the choice of Kilcher, the 15-year-old who plays Pocahontas.
"First of all, she's part Indian," Green said. "Secondly, she really put her heart into it. You could see her every day on the set, growing, wanting to know more.
"I don't think they could have found a better representative if they'd looked for a million years. She did a phenomenal job. She became Pocahontas."
At a screening Thursday night in Richmond for cast and staff that included many Indians, Sarah Green, the movie's producer, announced that she and Malick have decided to donate 5 percent of their share of the profits to the nine tribes of Virginia.
Robert Green expects it to be used to sue for federal recognition of the Virginia tribes. Those tribes are the only ones in the U.S. not eligible for federal programs for Indians. They lack federal benefits and protection because they were forced to sign a treaty before the country was formed.
Green believes the reason recognition of Virginia tribes has been blocked in modern times is the fear they might then build a casino in the state.
But the most important thing to come out of the movie, he said, is a CD made by a linguistics expert.
"It's on speaking the language, and they are donating it to the Virginia tribes so we can resurrect our language we lost so many years ago."
To reach MICHAEL ZITZ:
Email: mikez@freelancestar.com
