User Reviews

If you come to this just to see 'all them pretty little horses' gallivanting about, you won't be disappointed, but you'd also be missing the bigger picture. This is a film about a dying breed and I think that breed is man as much as Sitting Bull's favorite horse from days gone by. Leo Kuntz, the awkward yet uber cool Vietnam Vet and subject of the film comes across as part Sam Shepard, part Dos Equis commercial. For the duration of the film he very well might be the most interesting man in the world. Much more than just a nostalgic glance at a way of life that's getting harder and harder to sustain, Garland's extraordinary eye for composition and the wry character driven observations makes this unmissable. Oozing atmosphere and with an almost noir documentary style this leaves me hungry for this filmmaker's next endeavor.

There's a real sense of poignancy that permeates this film. Nokota Heart follows Leo - a horse rancher in North Dakota - and what at times seems like his futile attempts at preserving the bloodline of Sitting Bull's wild horses, and possibly his own legacy.

Oddly enough, watching this film reminded me of a great scene from The Sopranos, where Tony is explaining how he feels that the best is over and the party that is/was America is ending. That sentiment is very much echoed through this film, and a lot of the time I was left wondering just how many Leo's there are left.

The film looks and sounds incredible, and conveys both the desolation and beauty of North Dakota. Set against this backdrop is Leo and his family, and of course the majestic horses themselves.

I loved this film, as it captures something which is in real danger of being lost, and there's a real feeling that this is somehow preserving it all - the sights, the sounds, the people. On that point, this film shows the real, warts-and-all people involved - and Leo especially is an incredible character who surely would have to be invented if he didn't already exist!

I definitely recommend this film, and ideally on the big screen. Ironically, it's only set against this vast backdrop that the larger- than-life Leo can be fully appreciated.

Nokota Heart is the story about a dying pocket of American culture, lovingly shot by Irish director Sean Garland. The film tells the unique story of rancher Leo Kuntz - Vietnam vet, grizzled frontiersman, and breeder of soon-to-be-extinct Nokota horses, rode by Leo's idol Sitting Bull. The preservation of these amazing creatures has constantly been under threat since the early 1900s in Midwestern states, until brothers Leo and Frank Kuntz began purchasing horses in the late '70s and set up a foundation to protect them.

As an American (admittedly not from the Midwest but the suburban jungles of New York), Nokota Heart was a very intriguing and often heart-rending portrait of a part of the culture that I was not initially aware of. Although Leo is an inimitable subject whose no-sh*t one-liners are humorous and down-homey, you can tell that under his calm, gruff exterior is a man deeply saddened by the gradual passing of an era. Something that really stayed with me was Leo's story about how the Native American population in North Dakota are slowly becoming modernised and losing interest with the horses tamed by their ancestors in the 1800s.

Unfortunately, I think one of Leo's friends summed it up best by saying that the Kuntzes are trying to preserve something that has become irrelevant. In our modern age of smart phones, on demand TV and instant access technology, it's sad to think that people like Leo and all of the things he has worked so hard for are gradually fading away.

The film has some incredible shots of the North Dakota badlands, herds of horses thunderously pounding through the fields, and also some fantastic, unintentionally (?) surreal moments, such as when a group of Nokotas all stand peering into the camera lens simultaneously, eerily calm and still in the Midwestern sunset. A beautifully made campfire tale of a fading way of life.

I was lucky enough to catch a screening of this poignant documentary at the Prince Charles Cinema in London's West End yesterday. Sean Garland's NokotaHeart focuses on the plight of taciturn horse rancher Leo Kuntz and his struggle to preserve the bloodline of Sitting Bull's wild horses in the desolate badlands of North Dakota.

Kuntz is a man of few words and stubborn conviction, a frontiersman in a post-industrial America reminiscent of a Peckinpah protagonist. As he endures brutal winters and skates on the edge of financial ruin, Leo's lone struggle to preserve these horses - with no assistance from either the government or the Native American community - becomes deeply moving.

The film's tone darkens as Leo recalls his brushes with death in Vietnam, where he eerily received an identical wound as his hero Sitting Bull (a bullet in the left hip). Occasional jabs of dry humour relieve the bleak tone. "Us Kuntzes is born poor," Leo remarks with a pained grin, "and we damn well do our best to die poor."

The film is atmospherically photographed by director Sean Garland, who evokes a desolate beauty in the (sometimes snowswept) plains, suffusing the film in an elegiac magic hour glow. Special mention must also go to Patrick O'Hearn's delicate score and Lawrence Fee's taut editing.

NokotaHeart is ultimately a moving portrait of a shred of American history in danger of being lost forever. The film has already won awards on the festival circuit (including Best Feature Documentary at the White Sands International Film Festival) and I hope it gains the wide exposure necessary to highlight Leo's plight.