In Celluloid Indians, Kilpatrick writes that Harold of Orange "privileges the Native audience in the way that Hollywood films have privileged the mainstream audiences from the beginning of film history" (192). While a Native audiences gets the jokes and recognizes the issues the film addresses, it is harder for a mainstream audience to pick up on all of this, although some of the issues include white fantasies about Indians, stereotypes, colonialism (the Bureau of Indian Affairs), genocide (the Ghost Dance and the Massacre at Wounded Knee), the commodification (commercialization) and acquisition of Indians and their culture (through collecting of "artifacts") and the display of Indians/artifacts in museums.
Kilpatrick writes that Harold and his Warriors are trying to get a grant from a nonprofit, charitable foundation, "where--from a native American trickster's point of view--white money launders its conscience" (183). In other words, the tricksters are actually giving the white foundation what it wants: an opportunity to assuage its guilt over the U.S.'s treatment of Native Americans. While the board members aren't aware of their patronizing and patriarchal attitude toward Harold and the Warriors, Native people having been having to deal with it for hundreds of years. From the author/writer Gerald Vizenor and Harold's point of view, laughter and imagination are better ways to deal with these issues than are anger, violence or depression.
Questions for discussion and reflection:
- Do you feel, as an audience member, that you understand the film?
- What problems are there with marketing this movie in a commercially successful way?
- How does this movie align with other narratives or films we have studied to date in this course?
Link to watch the movie online via SnagFilms: http://www.snagfilms.com/films/title/harold_of_orange
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