Smoke Signals (1998)

Smoke Signals, film directed by Chris Eyre, is one of the greatest drama productions. The film, first presented in 1998, represents the current life of the Native Americans. The actors of this drama effectively embodied the different characters. For instance, Evan Adams as Thomas has inimitable ambiance and a great sense of humor which lids him to play a key role in the film. On the other hand, Adam Beach as Victor is one of the film stars who play the opposing character of Thomas, a serious and formal man. Smoke Signals is the first Native American film production, including actors, writer, and director. In addition, the film received several awards between 1998 and 1999 from different organizations. The film mainly focuses on Thomas and Victor, who are the key characters of the movie, and their life in a Native American reservation in Idaho. Victor is a basketball player and Thomas is a storyteller. Both of them are linked with Gary Farmer as Arnold who is Victor's father. In the beginning of the film, Arnold rescues Thomas when he was a baby from a house fire that killed his parents. After that, Thomas start treating Arnold as a father or a role model, but Victor and his mother were suffering from Arnold since he was alcoholic and he treated them violently. As a result, Arnold leaves his house and the reservation to go to Phoenix and complete the rest of his life there. A couple of years later, Arnold dies and leaves his properties in Phoenix. Therefore, Victor headed Phoenix in order to get his father's possessions and Thomas asked him to be his travel meet. At this trip Victor and Thomas faced many adventure events which make them closer than their childhood. Victor started to convince Thomas in order to change his appearance to be more as Native American and Thomas accepted. When they arrived to Phoenix, Thomas and Victor met Suzie who was Arnold's friend. Suzie tried to change Arnold image in Victor's mind by telling him the truth about the fire that Arnold made when he was drunk which caused the death of Thomas's parents. The film Smoke Signals is highly qualified production in all aspects. One of those great aspects is the film main story. The film was written by Sherman Alexei who writes the story in a logical way that makes it greatly reliable and simple. The well linked events of the story serve to a greater understanding of the Native American issues. A good example of these issues is the trouble relationship between father and son. Although this movie was filmed in the late nineties, the effects are quite surprising. Another interesting aspect of the movie is the cast. The cast were not Hollywood stars, but they preformed their parts well. Instead of hiring regular actors, the director chose to hire Native Americans to play the role or to simply to be themselves. Smoke Signals is a great film since it has carries a message, something which current movies lack. I believe that Native Americans are living in sort of limitation since they are living on a reservation that is under developed comparing it with other American civilization. The movie reflects a different kind of life style with a mix of values which shows us that people with different values can still live together and perhaps the differences are makes us more united. Considering the date of production and that it is the first movie made by Native Americans, I believe they did an overall good work that is why I would rate it with 4 stars.

The more you try to describe a movie like Smoke Signals the likelier it is that you'll kill it. The story basically is about a son who eventually reaches some understanding concerning his father, who left the family years ago. The discovery and acceptance by the resentful Victor Joseph of his father's own unhappiness plays out in a road trip Victor and his friend, Thomas Builds-the-Fire, take from the Coeur d'Alene Indian Reservation in Idaho where they live to Phoenix to pick up the father's ashes. This sort of story has been so often turgidly overplayed by film-makers searching for "truth" that it's a surprise to find just how touching and humorous Smoke Signals turns out to be. The story may be about a search of discovery, but it's played out against the friction of reservation life in a white world. The humor carries a lot of irony but the dialog and situations are so gentle and natural that the inherent messages don't slam us about. There's no victim card being played here, just some truths told with the kind of underplayed honesty that makes ethnic humor, delivered by those same ethnic people, work not just for them but for those in a white world who are overhearing. Victor Joseph (Adam Beach) is a big, good looking young man who barely gets along, plays basketball and carries a chip on his shoulder. Thomas Builds-the-Fire (Evan Adams) is a scrawny, glasses-wearing young man who tells stories and talks about almost everything. Thomas has been raised by his grandmother. A fire killed his parents and it was Victor's father, Arnold Joseph (Gary Farmer), who caught Thomas, just a baby, when Thomas was tossed from a second floor window. Arnold Joseph was a big man, quick to laugh and quick to hit, maybe not a drunk but close to it. He denied being a hero. One day, when Victor was about 12, Arnold Joseph picked up and left. Victor never forgave him. When word of Arnold's death reaches Victor's mother. Victor decides he must get the ashes, but he doesn't have enough money. "Hey Victor!" Thomas says, "I'm sorry 'bout your dad." "How'd you hear about it?" Victor asks. "I heard it on the wind," Thomas says, "I heard it from the birds. I felt it in the sunlight. And your mom was just in here cryin'." Thomas has some money in a jar and offers it if he can come along. Off they go, hitchhiking, taking a bus, walking. Along the way, while Victor wrestles with his feelings about the father who left him, screenwriter Sherman Alexie and director Chris Eyre give us the kind of edgy smiles that are rare nowadays. "You gotta look mean or people won't respect you," says Victor to Thomas on the bus to Phoenix. "White people will run all over you if you don't look mean. You gotta look like a warrior! You gotta look like you just came back from killing a buffalo!" "But our tribe never hunted buffalo -- we were fishermen," says Thomas. "What!" says Victor, "you want to look like you just came back from catching a fish? This ain't 'Dances With Salmon' you know!" Yes, they return to the reservations with the ashes. Victor winds up learning a lot about himself as well as about his father. He learns a good deal about what Thomas reaches for with all the stories Thomas tells. We learn a lot about the value of a quiet movie with a fine screenplay and skillful direction. We learn about fry bread. And as Thomas says, when the going gets tough, "Sometimes it's a good day to die, and sometimes it's a good day to have breakfast." All the actors do commendable jobs, but Evan Adams is a standout. When he closes his eyes and starts to spin one of Thomas' stories, you don't really want him to stop. Adams has the challenging job of bringing us to the movie's close, emotionally and thoughtfully. "Do we forgive our fathers in our age or in theirs, or in their deaths, saying it to them, or not saying it? If we forgive our fathers...what is left?" Smoke Signals is based on Sherman Alexie's book of stories, The Lone Ranger And Tonto Fistfight In Heaven.

Writer Sherman Alexie's new book, Flight, is his first in ten years, and would be another terrific movie (my review is at http://lakeconews.com/content/view/2580/42/ if you'd like to read it) and ten years between films is quite long enough. :-)Smoke Signals gives us an aspect of Native Americans most of us rarely see, their wonderful humor--possibly what saves us white folks from the kind of violent retaliation we see in other occupied lands. Road movie, rez movie,coming of age--it's all that. It would be perfect for discussion in film classes or community groups, especially if there are native people in the group to talk about their reactions to it.

I saw Smoke Signals in my American cultures class. Seeing it from that point of view may have heightened my enjoyment of the film, but on its own merits it is still a fine film.Two young men, Victor Joseph and Thomas Builds-the-Fire, who grew up on a reservation together, set out to obtain the cremated ashes of Victor's estranged father, Arnold. These two are very engaging and fun to watch, thanks in no little part to the inspired performances by their actors. Like in any good film, their journey develops into something greater than picking something up. The ride director Chris Eyre takes us on is enjoyable and does not overstay its welcome.The entire cast and crew of Smoke Signals is Native American, giving it an interesting perspective, similar to movies like Thunderheart and Dances with Wolves. The audience is presented with contemporary life on the reservation, simply as it is. We get not just caricatures, but what feels like real people interacting with each other, living their lives. That alone merits a viewing of this film.Smoke Signals is a very solid, entertaining film that should be watched by anyone who wants to be aware of cultures in the United States or at the very least entertained.