The Movie ‘Dances With Wolves’

Dances with Wolves

 

For the novel by Michael Blake, see Dances with Wolves (novel). For The song by Mount Eerie, see Mount Eerie Dances with Wolves.

Dances with Wolves is a 1990 American epic western film starring, directed, and produced by Kevin Costner in his feature directorial debut. It is a film adaptation of the 1988 novel Dances with Wolves by Michael Blake that tells the story of Union Army Lieutenant John J. Dunbar (Costner), who travels to the American frontier to find a military post, and who meets a group of Lakota.

 

Directed by

Kevin Costner

Screenplay by

Michael Blake

 

Based on

Dances with Wolves

by Michael Blake

 

Produced by

Jim Wilson

Kevin Costner

 

Starring

Kevin Costner

Mary McDonnell

Graham Greene

Rodney Grant

 

Cinematography

Dean Semler

 

Edited by

Neil Travis

 

Music by

John Barry

 

Production

companies

Tig Productions

Majestic Films International

 

Distributed by

Orion Pictures

 

Release dates

October 19, 1990 (Uptown Theater)

November 9, 1990 (United States)

 

Running time

181 minutes[1]

 

Country

United States

 

Languages

English

Lakota

Pawnee

 

Budget

$22 million[2]

 

Box office

$424.2 million[2]

 

Costner developed the film with an initial budget of $15 million.[3] Much of the dialogue is spoken in Lakota with English subtitles. It was shot from July to November 1989 in South Dakota and Wyoming, and translated by Doris Leader Charge,[4] of the Lakota Studies department at Sinte Gleska University.

 

The film earned favorable reviews from critics and audiences, who praised Costner's directing, the performances, screenplay, score, cinematography, and production values. It was a box office hit, grossing $424.2 million worldwide, making it the fourth-highest-grossing film of 1990, and is the highest-grossing film for Orion Pictures. The film was nominated for 12 Academy Awards at the 63rd Academy Awards and won seven, including Best Picture, Best Director for Costner, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Film Editing, Best Cinematography, Best Original Score, and Best Sound Mixing. The film also won the Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture – Drama. It is one of only three Westerns to win the Oscar for Best Picture, the other two being Cimarron (1931) and Unforgiven (1992).

 

It is credited as a leading influence for the revitalization of the Western genre of filmmaking in Hollywood. In 2007, Dances with Wolves was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".[5][6]

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