Reel Injun

I stumbled upon this somewhere, and the idea was intriguing right away. A documentary looking at how Native Americans have been portrayed in Hollywood, and how that shaped their image in the minds of people, and from an NA filmmaker? Sign me up. That is exactly what it delivers, breaking it down into several generations of cinema: the silent era, where Indians were treated as heroic and mythical. The beginning of talkies, where westerns ruled supreme and turned Indians into mindless savages to be mowed down by the noble plainsman. The co-opting of Indian culture in the 60's in the hippie movement, and the slow reframing of Indians as a beleaguered group that had been mistreated and mischaracterized by movies and the media. And then, into the 90's and beyond, where NA's were presented as whole people, with strengths and weaknesses, individual identities, passions, hopes, flaws, and failures. Along the way, the filmmakers meet prominent NA's, from former revolutionaries -- one of the participants of the Alcatraz takeover, and one of the survivors of the Wounded Knee showdown with the FBI -- to actors to historians and more. If you're expecting some fire-and-brimstone condemnation of Hollywood and pop culture, this isn't your movie; it is thoughtful and thought-provoking, a historical examination that values the NA experience and viewpoint, but also values measured analysis, and a holistic view of history, from the beginning to the current day of 2009. where movies are being made wholly by indigenous people and getting wide releases, and NA actors can play roles that don't just slot them as NA characters but as human beings first. Which is all well and good. It would've been contradictory to take a 30,000 view of 100 years of film history while spitting fire and anger without acknowledging the strides that have been made. It would've been equally disingenuous to blow off all the history as "that was in the past, we're good now". But all of this comes at a cost, and that is a thoroughly underwhelming, dispassionate recitation and narration. I wasn't expecting righteous anger over the past or fawning appreciation for the present, but I also wasn't expecting the whole thing to be read like someone trying to read their child the phone book as a bedtime story. When Hollywood started treating Indians as faceless savages to be shot by the heroic cowboy, and especially when they'd cast a white person as an Indian, you'd think there might be a LITTLE anger. When it talks about Sacheen Littlefeather at the Academy Awards, or the first NA stand-up comedian on TV, you'd think there would be a little more pride. These are all given the same emotional weight in discussion. I know they were attempting some historical objectivity here, but there's being objective and being detatched, and it feels more like the latter than the former. I've seen exhibits in the Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame that stirred up more emotion. Reel Injun is informative, and it is eye-opening. There's a lot I didn't know about. From a purely informational standpoint, this succeeds. But how you deliver the message is as valuable as the content of the message itself. Reel Injun seems to think a dry recitation of information is good enough. I can read a book for that.