Preview of Rez Bomb

HollywoodThe new film by Steven Lewis, Rez Bomb, pairs Tamara Feldman (Dirty Sexy Money, Hatchet, Perfect Stranger) as a Lakota woman and Trent Ford (How to Deal, Gosford Park, September Dawn) as her white boyfriend. The film also provides a juicy part for native American actor and activist Russell Means (Last of the Mohicans, Natural Born Killers).

Lovers from different backgrounds run afoul of a ruthless money lender and find themselves in a race against the clock to bail themselves out of a dangerous situation. While the location shooting in South Dakota takes advantage of the desolate plains and mountains of the area and the obvious poverty of the Reservation itself, it tells a universal story that would not have been out of place in Rio, Marseilles, Addis Abbaba, Calcutta or any other atmospheric location of decay.


Comment:  I don't know how good Rez Bomb is, but it looks visually interesting. More to the point, it's the kind of movie we need more of: thrillers that just happen to be set on reservations rather than rez-based stories that just happened to have a thrill or two.

Of course, setting the movie on Pine Ridge is a big cliché. If Pine Ridge and the Navajo rez closed shop, would that be the end of Native filmmaking? Isn't anyone willing to do a Native film anywhere else?

For more on the subject, see The Best Indian Movies.