From Fangoria:

“DANCES WITH WEREWOLVES is a working title, and the movie is a classic American romance which will be done mostly in the Lakota language,” [Actor Noah] Segan tells Fango. “Set against the pioneering days of the Wild West, the insecurity of Reconstruction after the Civil War and the tumultuous relationship between white settlers and Native Americans, we examine how encroaching civilization drives a tribe, as a last resort, to invoke lycanthropy to defend their land and way of life. When a young pioneer and a Native American princess fall in love, the impending battle between their two families could at least tear them apart, if not tear them to shreds. Think ROMEO & JULIET meets BROTHERHOOD OF THE WOLF meets RAVENOUS.”

Rez Bomb is a love story/thriller about a Lakota girl, Harmony and a white guy, Scott who are very much in love but get into trouble with a brutal loan shark, Jaws. Jaws threatens Scott as he’s being released from six weeks in jail that if his now hefty debt including interest isn’t paid off by midnight its curtains.

Scott thinks he can pay it courtesy of a stash of pills he has hidden inside his guitar so heads to his home on Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, which he shares with Harmony. It is the poorest place in the USA and a world apart from the more affluent upbringing he had in Rapid City, South Dakota.

There he discovers both Harmony and the guitar are missing. So he goes searching for them both. We inter-cut his quest with Harmony’s previous six weeks as she flees Jaws. After taking a beating and discovering she’s pregnant she’s offered a place in protective housing allowing her to disappear from those chasing her. In the process she pawns all their valuables, including the guitar.

As Scott searches for her he is forced to confront his past and their families who oppose their relationship.

Check out the movie trailer here.

Death of Custer – A dramatic portrayal of Sitting Bull stabbing Custer, with dead Native Americans lying on ground, in scene by Pawnee Bill’s Wild West Show performers. c.1905

Was Custer Outgunned at Little Bighorn?

via Neatorama:

The Battle of Little Bighorn happened 133 years ago today. George Custer and his men were certainly outnumbered, but their defeat may have also been assured by the Lakota and Cheyenne warriors’ superior weaponry.

If the Indians were, in fact, better armed at the Battle of the Little Bighorn, Custer may have contributed to the situation by declining to include Gatling guns in his van. Because he was setting off on what amounted to a search-and-destroy mission, he argued that the Gatlings were too cumbersome and would only slow him down.

At the point where he was surrounded and outnumbered by a ratio as high as 9-to-1, he probably regretted making that choice. In such a dire situation, the Gatling gun would have considerably reduced the enemy’s numerical advantage and may have even proven decisive in turning the tide.

The Lakota and Cheyenne warriors did join the battle with a number of Henry and Spencer repeating rifles, which provided a higher rate of fire than the single-shot Springfield Model 1873 carbines carried by the cavalry troopers.

In the end, several factors led to the deaths of the 197 men under Custer, each stemming from his underestimation of his adversaries. Link

deltafoxtrot:

by David Swallow
Indian Country Today - 2 January 2009

Young American Indians today suffer from many problems of the modern world. Alcohol and drug abuse, early pregnancies, gangs and psychological disorders are everywhere on the reservations. However, a lot of the development of these issues can be historically traced back to World War II or shortly before.

The 1924 Indian Citizenship Act created a special kind of dual citizenship which made American Indians into citizens of the United States (for the first time) as well as citizens of their own sovereign nations. Finally, Indians could vote. But also, for the first time, they could be drafted into the military.

The young Lakota Warriors looked at the military as a way to prove themselves as warriors. They believed it was an honorable extension of the traditional warrior ways.

So, young American Indians went off to WWII. After 100 years of forced boarding schools which resulted in generations of young Indians losing their sense of identity, family and traditions, the military became like the family they had never been allowed to have. They were grouped into companies which lived together and fought together and bonded with each other as a unit, as a family.

When the young warriors came home, they often became lost. With their military family no longer existing, gangs began to form to take their place. An example is the Hell’s Angels, the famous motorcycle gang, which was started in the late 1940s. It is commonly believed to have been founded by ex-members of famous military fighting units of the same name.
The young warrior knew his real purpose was to protect his people and their lives.

Then, in 1953, long after Prohibition had ended, President Eisenhower made it legal to sell alcohol to American Indians for the first time. This changed the lives of all Indian people.

In his grandfathers’ day, the Lakota warrior came from a good family where he had been taught good behavior, good manners, respect for all life and good relationship with all living things. His parents never lied to him and he never lied to anyone. He was reliable and practiced honor and respect with a clean mind.

Even with all those qualities, he still had to qualify to be a member of a warrior society. He had to prove himself. It wasn’t just about fighting. But when he did fight, even then he practiced respect. He never mutilated another warrior.

The young warrior also never stole from his own people. He never beat up or took advantage of his people. He never practiced sexual assaults on anyone.

The young warrior knew his real purpose was to protect his people and their lives. He knew his purpose was to protect the c’anunpa carriers, the sacred pipe carriers, and the holy men and spiritual leaders. He also listened to and learned from the holy men and spiritual leaders. He not only respected and protected life but he also learned to practice compassion. He acted with honor.

The young warrior knew that if he did all this, life would be beautiful and all would live in harmony.

But with the effects of alcohol, drugs, and the continuing policies of the federal government towards the Plains Tribes, most of this has become lost and forgotten.

These policies aren’t so different from those practiced against other ethnic groups throughout history. The Irish, the Italians, the Jewish, the Gypsies, and many others all experienced what was called ethnic cleansing. But, for the American Indian, the policies still continue today.

These policies try to force us to live in ghetto housing called cluster housing. These policies have taken away our traditional foods that kept us healthy. These policies have created a private state prison system that makes money on incarcerating our young people rather than rehabilitating them. These policies have kept my children, my grandchildren and nephews and nieces, from learning how to survive and live from the land.

These policies and politics have created the “haves” and the “have-nots,” a two-level society of extremes on the reservation favoring corruption and nepotism in BIA and reservation government relationships.

We have no YMCA. Many have no job or any possibility of a job. We have no vocational training centers. We have no residential treatment centers for children and teens as an alternative to jail like they have in the cities.

Hope is hard to find. So belonging to a gang has become the only way for many of our young people to feel good, to feel needed and wanted.

Now, they say the Lakota are “Third World welfare recipients.” But worse is the fact that our young people steal from each other. Our people shoot and hurt each other. They practice deceit and abuse our girls. Elders now live in fear. The traditional values of the Lakota warrior no longer exist. They have become lost to alcohol and drugs and gangs.

So today, I am calling on all young Lakota warriors and young Lakota people. We need you to help save the future generations to come. Not me, not Grandpa, I don’t need saving. But your children and your grandchildren do.

Get back into your own traditional spirituality and traditional ways and values. Those hold the answers for you. Those will guide you and help you to know who you are more than any gang ever could. And it will be you who will bring the harmony back to our lives.

It will be you who will bring back hope to our People.

Ho he’cetu yelo. I have spoken these words.

(David Swallow, Wowitan Yuha Mani, is a Lakota spiritual leader and a Headman of the Lakota Nation. He resides on the Pine Ridge Reservation in Porcupine, S.D.)