September 19, 2006

Summing up Mel Gibson

Indian Comics Irregular #144:  Mad Mel's Upcoming Apocalypto

4 comments:

Rob said...

Thanks, Russ. I saw this article on PECHANGA.net. I wasn't going to post it here because I don't like to publicize too many prospective events. The real news is the outcome of the screening: how Native people react to the movie.

Rob said...

Even if it's genuine news, I don't want to cover every step of Gibson's rollout of Apocalypto and help him generate publicity. As far as I'm concerned, the real news begins when the movie premieres.

Rob said...

Insiders are saying Apocalypto may be in trouble. Why? Since the subject material is obscure, Disney was going to promote Mel Gibson's role as its creator. Oops. Now what?

I don't necessarily wish ill fortune for inferior Native movies. Even a bad Native movie generates publicity for Native cultures and causes. And a bad movie can be instructive. It can teach us creative types what not to do.

Rob said...

A correspondent's comments:

I have a sinking feeling that you're closer to being on target with your Mel predictions than we can even imagine right now.

On the other hand, a little bad publicity might be worth it, IF the wannabe crowd & new-agers would decide that they don't want to be Indian anymore, and crawl back into the holes they crawled out of. After "Dances with Kevin" was released (circa 1989), it's been reminiscent of the 60's & early 70's when all the hippies decided to "play Indian". Away from Oklahoma, people still treat us like we're mystical people. We're not computer programmers and machinists and nurses and highway patrolmen, we're mystical noble savages. That's sometimes worse than being treated like scum of the earth by the remaining racists around Oklahoma.

My "dad" (Otoe-Pawnee) instructed me to tell people that I'm Otoe when we were out in public at dance performances. He knew I was sick to death of people in the crowd saying "My great-great-grandmother was a Cherokee Princess!" He used to say "Don't tell them you're Cherokee, just tell them you're MY daughter. You COULD be my daughter! I was quite a tomcat when I was young!" LOL