Film: American Indian Film Festival, Season Forty Seven

Program 12 • The Doctrine of Recovery, 11 a.m.–12:45 p.m.

Stolen Spirits

In 2021, in the small rural town of Genoa Nebraska, a harrowing search commenced to locate the graves of Native America children who were taken from their tribes and sent to the Genoa U.S Indian Industrial school, one of America’s largest and longest running boarding schools for indigenous children. The Genoa school was part of a vast network of institutions for Native American children set up in the 19th and 20th centuries across the USA. Their purpose was to assimilate indigenous children into the white man’s world. By 1926, it’s estimated more than 80 per cent of Native American children were enrolled in these institutions. Many of these children left the school their culture broken, some didn’t return home at all. Last year, the discovery of more than a thousand graves of children at the sites of former boarding schools in Canada pushed the USA to examine its own history. Presented by ABC journalist Stan Grant, whose family was impacted by Australia’s assimilationist policies, Stolen Spirits is a powerful and haunting story of one community’s attempts to uncover the truth about a painful past.

The Doctrine of Recovery

And so it began, with the Papal Bull of 1493. Pope Alexander VI’s apocalyptic declaration established a free-for-all in the European conquest of Tribal lands and souls. It was their “Doctrine of Discovery.” To us, the First People of this land, it was a death song we had never heard, but soon enough, we would all sing. 529 years later, the ongoing and devastating formula patterned by the Doctrine of Discovery clearly continues to be useful in the church of patriarchy since this very month (August 2022) the Pope refused to rescind it during his visit to Canada.

Program 13 • Narrative Shorts, 1:15–3:40 p.m.

Burros

In southern Arizona, twenty miles from the Mexico border, a young Indigenous girl discovers a Latina migrant her age who has been separated from her father while traveling through the Tohono O’odham Nation into the United States.

Serving Shaid

While checking out a new local boutique in her neighbourhood, Shaid (20’s Cree) is racially profiled by the staff. Disappointed but not surprised by the “Indigenous shopping experience” she’s treated to (i.e.: being followed around the store), Shaid decides to take matters into her own hands and put the staff in their place. While all eyes are on Shaid in the boutique, a more serious threat lurks in the store and goes unnoticed. Shaid draws the courage to speak up for herself (and get the last laugh) from her mom, who she texts with while shopping.

Seeds

Without parents to guide them, Loretta and Raven reflect on the love their parents modeled and the grief of their loss. While one finds catharsis in their mother’s old VHS camera the other struggles with a potential pregnancy.

Dead Bird Hearts A love story between an incompetent Indigenous man and his dog after being made homeless after a breakup.

The Daily Life of Mistress Red

A mockumentary that explores the world of kink, native women and defeating white supremacy on one's own terms. Taylor is a blogger for an Indigenous women's website and wants to interview her favorite idol Marie Callingbird; a Native fashion boutique owner by day and to her surprise, Mistress Red. This project focuses on issues within the circle of indigenous women, racism and the acceptance of sexuality. This story follows a journey or what sexuality is to indigenous women and what it can do to empower them.

Landback, Waterback

Hawk, a Tongva youth in his native Los Angeles, is on a quest to get water from a special spring. But first, he must get his unknowing auntie to help.

Conviction

After Joseph is released from jail, he faces inner demons that stand in the way of true freedom. Part of the 2022 imagineNATIVE Film + Media Arts Festival commission/mentorship program

Good Grief

Rebecca, an Indigenous woman, must return to her childhood home to repair past family relationships with her Caucasian family, after she receives news that her grandmother has died.

Call Me AWOL

After a failed prison escape, Seventeen-year-old Lance receives a visit from his social worker at the correctional facility. Her terms are simple, keep his head down, stay out of trouble, finish his time or face finishing his sentence at the adult penitentiary. For an indigenous youth who has spent his entire life institutionalized, the prospect of more time in prison has become routine, but when an opportunity for freedom arises, what’s another six months in jail?

TwoBears

Casey TwoBears is a Marine Corps veteran, ex-junkie, and former county inmate. While working as a janitor for a boxing gym, Casey volunteers be the sparring partner for the local "champ" in order to prove his worth as a warrior in the ring, but also to prove himself as the modern warrior that his daughter and grandson can depend on.

Program 14 • Broken Angel, 4:10–6:00

We Are Still Here

In a powerful story of resilience and survival, Otgadahe Whitman-Fox, a First Nations Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara woman from North Dakota, re-enacts the true story of her grandmother. Wracked with fever from small pox caught from infected blankets, she is left behind so that her tribe could survive. Dragging herself to be submerged into the icy waters of the river, she calls on mother earth, and survives to rejoin her tribe, renewed and strong.

Broken Angel

ANGEL, mother to TANIS, escapes into the night from her abusive partner EARL to a women’s shelter on the reservation. As the prospect of a new beginning comes to light, he tracks her down and she is forced to flee or fight.

From Nov. 5–10, AIFF 47 will offer free film screenings at SFPL’s Main Library, Koret Auditorium.

Since its inception in 1975, the mission of the American Indian Film Festival (AIFF) has steadfastly been the cultural exchange—through the power of film—of Native American and Canada’s First Nations cultures. While the content is by, for and about Indigenous storytellers, AIFF remains a film festival for all audiences—from filmmakers whose intent is to inform, educate, enlighten and entertain all viewers. With the American Indian Film Institute director Mytia Zavala at the helm, and carrying on the work of her late father, founder Michael Smith, AIFF welcomes film fans back to the Bay. After two years of virtual film festivals, the American Indian Film Institute is excited to bring AIFF 47 in-person to film fans in San Francisco, featuring live events, panel discussions, food demos and an award show to showcase and celebrate the best of Native film.  

The AIFF47 film schedule and information is available at aifisf.com.

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