smoke signals essay

What Smoke Signals Means 20 Years Later

This groundbreaking film was the first movie to be written, directed, co-produced, and acted by Native Americans.

Twenty years ago, director Chris Eyre directed and co-produced Smoke Signals , a coming of age story featuring Adam Beach, Evan Adams, Irene Bedard, Gary Farmer, and American Indian Movement (AIM) activist John Trudell. Although it might now make us uncomfortable that the screenplay and the book were written by Sherman Alexie, who has recently been accused of sexual misconduct , the movie was groundbreaking in that it was the first movie to be written, directed, co-produced, and acted by Native Americans.

In 2005, Native American Studies scholar Joanna Hearne explored the ways in which indigenous filmmakers used film production as a site for “cultural revival .” She introduces a number of scenes from Smoke Signals to illustrate “specific moments when the filmmakers strategically intervene in media representations and appropriate media tools for the purposes of visual sovereignty.”

Sound is key in Hearne’s analysis. In the opening scene of the film, John Trudell’s voice narrates the reservation radio, welcoming an audience to both the radio show and the film itself, while also setting up the day and location for moviegoers: “Good morning. This is Randy Peone on KREZ radio, the voice of the Coeur d’Alene Indian reservation, and it’s time for the morning traffic report on this rainy bicentennial fourth of July.”

Hearne argues that in casting Trudell, Smoke Signals immediately “politicizes the role” because of “past media coverage of AIM, and Trudell’s mellow, humorous performance as a radio host suggests the film’s self-conscious presentation as a new indigenous voice in popular culture.”

Another poetic, powerful moment comes when the two protagonists, Victor and Thomas, are on a bus going from Idaho to Arizona. Two racist white men take their seats, telling them to “find someplace else to have a powwow.” Victor and Thomas reluctantly move to the back of the bus. Hearne argues that this “not only re-creates the bus as the segregated social space of the American South in the Civil Rights era, but also echoes the federal policies of Relocation and dislocation of Native tribes.”

Soon after this move, however, Victor and Thomas continue their conversation—one which, much like the film itself, is constantly playing with dismantling and challenging dominant Native stereotypes. They discuss Western movies and Victor argues that viewers never see John Wayne’s teeth in his movies. After this assertion, he begins tapping his hands, making an audible rhythmic noise. He begins singing repetitive verses, posing his question through acoustic song:

“John Wayne’s teeth, hey ya, John Wayne’s teeth, hey ya, hey ya hey ya hey… Are they false, are they real, are they plastic, are they steel, hey ya, hey ya, hey.”

Thomas joins in and through both song and sound, they reclaim their place on the bus, “transforming the marginalized space of the rear seats into a platform for protest through powwow or ‘49’ music.”

Hearne argues that Chris Eyre uses powerful scenes like this to change “discourses about indigenous identities in the contested arena of popular culture.” Smoke Signals was popular in Native communities as well as the “over culture,” as Eyre puts it. The film has continued to reach and engage a broad audience with this transformative discourse.

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Home — Essay Samples — Life — Forgiveness — Smoke Signals: Themes of Identity and Healing

Smoke Signals: Themes of Identity and Healing

• Categories: Cinematography Cultural Anthropology Forgiveness

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“Smoke Signals” by Chris Eyre Essay

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Introduction

The relationships between characters, unexpected moment, the quality of filming, film’s title symbolism, the plot of the film, works cited.

• Title: Smoke Signals
• Director: Chris Eyre
• Year of Release: 1998
• Director of Photography/Cinematographer: Brian Capener
• Editor: Brian Berdan
• Cast: Adam Beach – Victor Joseph, Evan Adams – Thomas Builds-the-Fire, Irene Bedard – Suzy Song, Gary Farmer Arnold Joseph.

“Though this is very much the first feature…, ”Smoke Signals” shows colorful style and a wisdom beyond precocity about its setting and its people” – the film got the following remarks from the New York Times journalist Janet Maslin (Maslin). There is no doubt that the film is highly emotional, explores not only ethnic problems and discrepancies the two young men face in their pursuit of knowledge but the issues of identity, self-understanding, and coordination of the truth of life with everything they knew before.

Chris Eyre showed himself as a skillful creator of the genuinely Native American story seen with the eyes of two young guys traveling in the search of the remains of their father, who face the country they have never seen before but which they, nevertheless, want to get familiar with. In some points, the film shows their humoristic naivety, but in general, the film is highly depictive both from the point of view of purely individualistic traits and relations and the nationwide scope of the Native American perception. The director was trying to break the long-existing stereotypes about violent Native Americans incarcerated in their reservations and living according to their sacred, mysterious canons that do not fit in the commonly accepted social life – he depicted the two ordinary young men in the turning point of their life.

Their interrelations are very expressive from the point of view of their origin, with Victor being the native son of his father, and Thomas is an ‘adopted’ child, the saved boy whom Victor’s father rescued in his childhood. They both love their father, but only Thomas knows his real inner self: it was Thomas who lived under one roof with his father for his whole life and suffered violence and humiliation, alcoholism, and the unexpectedness of his father (Smoke Signals). However, both guys as people deeply attached to their roots love their father dearly, which initiates their journey from the reservation to Phoenix, to get their father back home. The story of their trip is becoming much more complex and heterogeneous as the differences between Victor and Thomas are revealed in the course of the narrative:

The boys have been rivals and opposites ever since. Victor is the bigger and sterner of the two, with Thomas as his screwball sidekick. It is Victor, for instance, who accuses Thomas of having gotten his ideas of Indian behavior from too many viewings of ”Dances With Wolves” and advises him to quit grinning, start scowling and toughen up (Maslin).

The end of the film brings about an unexpected turning point for both Arnold’s sons, especially for Thomas – the boy who loved Arnold all his life for being saved from the fire finds out that Arnold was the initial cause of the fire that brought death for his parents. The realization of the truth makes both characters look at their life and their relations in another way, making them closer than ever before. All their life was a rivalry full of jealousy towards one another – the tough, harsh Victor did not accept Thomas as a part of his life and his family. The newly discovered facts make them both look at their lives from another angle and reconsider everything that happened to them, making them close as never before.

Looking at the plot more thoroughly, it becomes clear that the film combines many ethic elements that signify the Native American culture and show the patterns of Native American ethnicity very explicitly and at times even unexpectedly for a regular American or Canadian viewer. The issues of self-identification in a narrow, family sense and in a broader sense of belonging to a certain culture collide in the course of the narrative, revealing the conflicts belaying the whole narrative.

Smoke Signals is alight with oddball nuances and wry observations: the reservation’s radio station, KREZ, uses a broken-down van at the deserted crossroads to gauge the (nonexistent) traffic conditions, and Victor’s mother Arlene (Cardinal) is a master in the fine art of flatbread-making. Subtle, lyrically haunting touches like these evoke a palpable sense of loss and the sub-poverty level of Native American life, but also unite the tribe – broken by alcohol and abuse though they may be – in long-held beliefs and rituals (Savlov).

The technical part of the film is performed with stunning proficiency – the shots are skillfully made producing the deep emotional effect and including many implications that are not voiced in dialogues but are meant by the silent scenes and actions of the heroes. Mise en scene represents the USA in the 1990s with the stereotypical perception of Native Americans by the society: the attitude to them by people they meet and interact with. The costumes of the main characters also speak for themselves – they are dressed up as real Indians, in plain and comfortable clothes, and are remarkable in the common society. Political and social conflict is fully revealed by the distorted perception of the guys by other people who were raised on pervert stereotypes and ignorance.

The title of the film is speaking for itself in several ways – “Smoke Signals” are highly symbolic in the respect of the meaning of the concept for both heroes. The first meaning that may be attached to the title is the shadow of the past represented by the fire in which parents of Thomas died and made him a part of the family of Arnold and Victor. On the other hand, these both guys symbolize smoke signals that they send to the rest of the community, eager to become a part of it but being rejected.

The topic that is traced in the film, which is the Native American ethnicity, stereotyping, and perception of Native Americans may be followed in some other films of the genre that are worth mentioning in the present work as well. For example, such films as “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” and “Little Big Man” also represent the way a stereotypical depiction of Native American people may be viewed from both sides of the barricade – from the side of the regular community and the side of the indigenous groups of the society as well.

The main juxtaposition of the plot is the peculiarity of world perception by both characters – Victor and Thomas. They were living in one reservation, Thomas being an orphan but still managing to retain a romanticized and mild perception of the contemporary reality, not seeing the cruelty and complexity of life Victor came across experiencing the violence of his father, Arnold.

The characters are harshly juxtaposed with one another, unwillingly united by one aim in one trip, evolving into friends and simply understanding people in the course of the film. Thomas teaches Victor to face the horrors of the past, put up with them and let them not prevent him from leading a full life in the present and future. From his side, Victor helps Thomas put up with the newly discovered truth and adjust to real life in a world full of incongruence, suffering, and trouble. They become a natural mix of different people helping each other evolve into something better, consequently creating a much stronger family unit than they could have ever supposed.

Little Big Man. Cinema Center Films, 1970.

Maslin, Janet. “Smoke Signals (1998). FILM FESTIVAL REVIEW; Miles to Go, and Worlds Apart”. New York Times . Web.

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. United Artists Warner Home Video, 1975.

Savlov, Mark. “Smoke Signals”. The Austin Chronicle, 1998. Web.

Smoke Signals. Miramax Films, 1998.

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IvyPanda. (2021, November 14). “Smoke Signals” by Chris Eyre. https://ivypanda.com/essays/smoke-signals-by-chris-eyre/

"“Smoke Signals” by Chris Eyre." IvyPanda , 14 Nov. 2021, ivypanda.com/essays/smoke-signals-by-chris-eyre/.

IvyPanda . (2021) '“Smoke Signals” by Chris Eyre'. 14 November.

IvyPanda . 2021. "“Smoke Signals” by Chris Eyre." November 14, 2021. https://ivypanda.com/essays/smoke-signals-by-chris-eyre/.

1. IvyPanda . "“Smoke Signals” by Chris Eyre." November 14, 2021. https://ivypanda.com/essays/smoke-signals-by-chris-eyre/.

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IvyPanda . "“Smoke Signals” by Chris Eyre." November 14, 2021. https://ivypanda.com/essays/smoke-signals-by-chris-eyre/.

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"It's a good day to be indigenous!'' the reservation radio deejay tells his American Indian listeners as "Smoke Signals'' opens. We cut to the station's traffic reporter, who scrutinizes an intersection that rarely seems to be used. "A big truck just went by,'' he announces. Later in the film, we will hear several choruses of a song about John Wayne 's false teeth.

"Smoke Signals'' comes billed as the first feature written, directed, co-produced and acted by American Indians. It hardly seems necessary to even announce that: The film is so relaxed about its characters, so much at home in their world, that we sense it's an inside job. Most films about Native Americans have had points to make and scores to settle, like all those earnest 1950s white films about blacks. Blaxploitation broke the ice and liberated unrehearsed black voices, and now here are two young Indians who speak freshly, humorously and for themselves.

The film opens in Idaho on a significant day: the Fourth of July, 1976. It's significant not only for America but for the infant Thomas Builds-the-Fire, who is saved by being thrown from an upper window when his house burns down at 3 a.m. He is caught in the arms of Arnold Joseph ( Gary Farmer ), a neighbor with a drinking problem, who is eventually thrown out by his wife ( Tantoo Cardinal ) and goes to live in Phoenix. He leaves behind his son Victor Joseph ( Adam Beach ).

And then, 20 years later, word comes that Arnold has died. Victor has a deep resentment against his father, but thinks he should go to Phoenix and pick up his ashes. He has no money for the journey, but Thomas Builds-the-Fire ( Evan Adams ) does--and offers to buy the bus tickets if Victor will take him along on the trip. That would be a big concession for Victor, who is tall and silent and has never much liked the skinny, talkative Thomas. But he has no choice. And as the movie settles into the rhythms of a road picture, the two characters talk, and the dialogue becomes the heart of the movie.

"Smoke Signals'' was written by Sherman Alexie , based on his book "The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven.'' He has a good ear for speech, and he allows his characters to refer to the real world, to TV and pop culture and the movies. (The reserved Victor, impatient with Thomas's chatter, accuses him of having learned most of what he knows about Indians by watching "Dances with Wolves,'' and advises him to spend more time "looking stoic.'') There are references to Gen. Custer and the U.S. Cavalry, to John Wayne and to U.S. policies toward Indians over the years, but "Smoke Signals'' is free of the oppressive weight of victim culture; these characters don't live in the past and define themselves by the crimes committed against their people. They are the next generation; I would assign them to Generation X if that didn't limit them too much.

If they are the future, Arnold, the Gary Farmer character, is the past. Victor nurses a resentment against him, but Joseph is understandably more open-minded, since the man did, after all, save his life. There are a few flashbacks to help explain the older man, and although they're brief, they're strong and well done: We see that Arnold is more complicated than his son imagines, and able to inspire the respect of the woman he was living with in Phoenix ( Irene Bedard ).

"Smoke Signals'' is, in a way, a continuation of a 1989 movie named "Powwow Highway,'' in which Farmer starred as a huge, gentle, insightful man, and A Martinez as more "modern.'' It, too, was a road movie, and it lived through its conversations. To see the two movies side-by-side is to observe how Native Americans, like all Americans, are not exempt from the melting pot--for better and worse.

The director, Chris Eyre , takes advantage of the road movie genre, which requires only a goal and then permits great freedom in the events along the way. The two men will eventually obtain the ashes, we expect, and also some wisdom. Meanwhile, we can watch them discover one another: the taciturn, inward man who was abused as a child, and the orphan who, it's true, seems to have gotten his world view at secondhand through the media.

There's a particular satisfaction in listening to people talk about what they know well and care about. The subject isn't as important as the feeling. Listen to them discuss the ins and outs of an Indian specialty known as "frybread,'' and you will sense what they know about the world.

Roger Ebert

Roger Ebert was the film critic of the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, he won the Pulitzer Prize for distinguished criticism.

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Smoke Signals (1998)

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Adam Beach as Victor Joseph

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Smoke signals are one of the oldest forms of long-distance communication. They are used to communicate news and danger, or to gather people in a common area. These signals are often associated with Native American cultures. Learn about the significance of smoke signals and the different types. We ll also...

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