A trailer for the documentary “LaDonna Harris: Indian 101” produced by Julianna Brannum

Last night, I caught the Association on American Indian Affairs Film Showcase at NYU’S Cantor Center where Firelight Media co-founder and CCNY alumnus, Stanley Nelson was honored. He directed Wounded Knee, episode 5 of  the PBS  We Shall Remain series, which I have not had a chance to see yet. After the trailer they showed last night, I can’t wait to check it out.

Shorts in the festival included “Macnpc,” directed by Tvli Jacobs (Choctaw), a one minute parody about native versus Anglo ways and a music video called “Steve’s Special” by Sonya Oberly (Nez Perce) that took place on the Tohono O’odham reservation. Young filmmakers were a big presence last night. Nuweetooun School students created an animation called “How Birds Got Their Song,” which adapts a traditional Narragansett story and which I thought was very pretty both visually and aurally. The Tesuque Pueblo Youth Film Group, Marcella Ernest, and Rachael Nez directed “Bonanza Creek,” a funny non-scripted film about Mohawk and Pueblo ancestors. And, 8th grader Camille Manybeads Tso (Dine-Navajo) directed “In the Footsteps of Yellow Woman,” a documentary/feature about her great great great grandmother and her courage during the Navajo Long Walk (1864-1868). The young people in this film did a very nice acting job.

I enjoyed the whole festival but the three films which were most arresting for me are the ones I only saw clips of. I already mentioned “Wounded Knee.” The second was the documentary “LaDonna Harris: INDIAN 101″ about the Comanche activist who has played a pivotal role in Native self determination and has started an Ambassadors program to teach and train future Native American leaders. A clip of that film heads this post. The third is Billy Luther’s “Grab,” a documentary about the Laguna Pueblo’s “Grab Day” celebration, where the tribe shares food and other things with their community. I smiled watching one of the trailer’s phrases shoot past:”Indian giver redefined.” I’m on Facebook with Billy and didn’t even know about his film, “Miss Navajo,” so as you can see, I have a lot of watching to catch up with! Will post here when I do. Thanks to Amalia Córdova of the NMAI Video and Film Center for letting me know about this festival and to Raquel Chapa for putting the line up together!

‘Til next time…