just watch it!

A waste of 90 minutes of my life

In other words,this film is a surreal ride.

There's a more than satisfactory amount of boom-boom in the movie's trim running time.

Arthur Penn had a great run of films starting with "Bonnie and Clyde" and (arguably) ending with "Night Moves" that all seem to deal with the abject failure of the American ideal and it's institutions. Dustin Hoffman stars as the oldest survivor of the Battle of Little Big Horn (in incredible old age make up by Dick Smith) who tells William Hickey his life story. Hoffman is adopted by the Cheyenne and raised as one of them after his family is killed in an attack by the Pawnee. He eventually rejoins white society and has a series of adventures mostly highlighted by the meanness and hypocrisy of everyone he meets. This culminates in him witnessing the (deserved) massacre of Custer's troops at Little Big Horn. This isn't Penn's best film, but it's one of the best films of it's era that uses the conventions of the Western to comment on the unrest in current society, especially about the war in Vietnam. It has a magnificent supporting cast highlighted by Richard Mulligan's bravura portrayal of Custer as an egomaniac.

Dustin Hoffman with Little Big Man joined the ranks of such players as Jeanette MacDonald, Susan Hayward, Agnes Moorehead, Barbara Stanwyck and Edward Judd. What he had in common with them is that he played a man greatly aged with make up reminiscing about his youth which was quite a colorful one. Later on Cicely Tyson and Emilio Estevez joined this select bunch.Poor Hoffman just can't find himself a niche in the world of the west either with white men or with Indians. He finds himself in the Dakota Territory of the 1870s and makes the acquaintance of such people as Wild Bill Hickok and George Armstrong Custer, a couple of old west legends who met famous premature deaths in the same year of 1876. And of course some lesser people in mostly low places.Hoffman gets some great support from people like Martin Balsam as a medicine show conman whom he spends some time with and Faye Dunaway as the widow woman who takes the orphan Hoffman in and explains and demonstrates the facts of life. Jeff Corey plays Wild Bill Hickok who explains to Hoffman he really doesn't have the right stuff to be a gunfighter.Best of all is Richard Mulligan as the controversial General George Armstrong Custer whose ambitions for military glory led to the massacre at Little Big Horn. Mulligan is ambitious and will not take good advice. Watching Little Big Man in the scenes with Mulligan it was like looking at Donald Trump campaigning for president. Just like The Donald, Mulligan will not listen to anyone other than himself. In fact you mostly have to use reverse psychology to get Mulligan to do things your way. Hoffman may be a misfit, not unlike his character in The Graduate, but he learns to play Mulligan like a piccolo.Little Big Man is a different and entertaining look at the old west and Hoffman is superb. But the one to really watch in this is Richard Mulligan. He steals the film in whatever scene he's in.

I am working my recent Ohio State B.A. in American History Degree into this movie: "Battle of Greasy Grass" is the Native American name for the Battle of Little Big Horn. It is now 2015. I never watched this movie before.I majored in History at OSU because I love history of movies, theatre, actors and actresses. In my History Degree, I have further studied their lives against historical events such as wars, depressions, etc. At Ohio State, I have studied Native American History, Civil War History, Western History, etc. Custer was a miscalculating, inept army officer busted down from General to Lieutenant Colonel. As is shown by Errol Flynn in They Died With their Boots On, Custer was a flamboyant God's Gift to Women. The Plains Indians (Cheyenne, Pawnee, etc.) were a unit I studied, including Custer's Little Big Horn.Custer and U.S. Grant were both West Point graduates; Custer was last in his class. Was he that stupid? In this film, he wears a bright red scarf and yellow suit in the final battle, saying to the Native Americans, "Here I am. Come and get me." At any rate, Grant was president, and jealous Custer wasn't. Grant died from throat cancer, but Custer was cut down on the battlefield.U.S. Grant: I wrote a biographical paper on him. He was no more alcoholic than other 19th century men, who drank more alcohol because it was purer than drinking water. His childhood hobby was raising horses. As a West Point cadet, he met his wife, Julia Dent Grant, his roommate's sister. He became a Civil War general and later U.S. President. When Grant was terminally ill with throat cancer, he wrote his autobiography to give Julia an income after his demise. Mark Twain had it published posthumously, giving Julia a substantial royalty check.American West: After the Civil War, army generals were posted to the western frontier. Custer had even fought at Gettysburg. It was thought that God wanted Americans to expand west to the Pacific Ocean.So here comes naïve young man Jack Crabb (fictional) into this melee of Cheyenne, Pawnee, settlers, army adventurers, gamblers, gunslingers, snakeoil salesmen, prostitutes. Jack is a sly dog. Did he really have five wives, four at once? Jack meets new Mrs. Robinson: Faye Dunaway. A gay Native American man wants to be Jack's Wife Number Six.This is a very funny movie, powerful and philosophical. History courses are now taught from Native American point of view. Little Big Horn was disastrous for the army, with Custer's reputation suffering.Historical fact: At Little Big Horn, many tribes gathered for their ginormous annual Sun Dance religious ceremony. They were still warriors. They knew Custer was coming. Custer figured they would be a small number, and he would slaughter them all. Thousands of Natives were at the Sun Dance, and they cleaned Custer's clock. They were very organized and calculating. Custer did not live to savor any victory.

Dustin Hoffman is Jack Crabb, a 121 year old man who recites his colorful life story to a journalist. Jack and his sister survive an attack by Pawnee Indians in which their parents' are killed. They are rescued by a Cheyenne warrior, but his sister escapes and he is raised by them and given the name Little Big Man for obvious reasons. Hoffman is as good as he was in The Graduate, with the same cool demeanor.At sixteen, he is recaptured by the U.S. Cavalry and turns against his adoptive family in order to fit in with his fellow white men. He gets "civlized" by a Reverend Silas and his sexually voracious wife Louise(Faye Dunaway). Jack hits the road with a snake oil salesman and happens upon his sister who believes that he should be a gunslinger and when he meets Wild Bill Hickock and witnesses a shooting, he decides against that career.Next up, Jack marries a Swedish woman named Olga and opens a store with a guy who turns out to be a crook and so the store closes. George Custer tells him, go west young man, and on the way, their stagecoach is captured by Cheyenne Indians and Olga is taken away. He reunites with his old tribal chief but leaves to find his missing wife. He joins up with Custer's 7th calvary and witnesses the slaughter of women and children by the heavily armed U.S. forces and turns against them. It all leads up to the famous battle of Little Big Horn. Little Big Man is a true epic western, and one of the best.