Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Smoke Signals Reflections


                 I believe that the role of storytelling in the film lies within the stereotypes of Native American Indians. When people think of Indians, (or maybe it’s just me) they think of a bunch of old wise men sitting around the fire telling stories and smoking the peace pipe. I believe that this image of Indians is one of the reasons why the filmmakers used flashbacks and narration to tell the story of Victor’s life. They didn’t use this storytelling stereotype to offend the Indians, but they did it to more-or-less honor them.
                  I also believe that music plays a similar stereotypical role in the movie as well. When you think of Indians, you think of beating drums and chanting. In this movie you don’t exactly hear Indians chanting and drums beating, but I did heard something similar. The music that played was very loud and tribal sounding, giving a cool, driving background noise to the exciting parts of the movie.
                  I find these two stereotypes very interesting because I don’t really know what to make of them. I am not an Indian, but I personally don’t see how any of these qualities could be seen as offensive. When we watched The Searchers, the stereotypes they used were blatantly racist and offensive because they made Indians seem like savages. However, I believe in this movie, they didn’t portray Indians in a bad way at all through the storytelling or tribal sounding music. This was probably because they wanted the audience to be on the same side as Victor and Thomas. I liked that they used these stereotypes to show Victor and Thomas in a positive light, and make them seem like the underdogs who conquer their demons in the end. It was a refreshing change. 

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