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Monday, January 1, 2018

'Sioux City' 1994 is full of cliche-driven Native American stereotypes

SIOUX CITY (1994) Lou Diamond Phillips served as director and lead actor. He portrays a Native American named, “Jesse Rainfeather Goldman” who was adopted into a white Jewish family. He grows up to become a hospital surgeon. He receives a letter from his real mother, “Dawn Rainfeather” on the Indian Reservation. He goes back only to discover that she was murdered by a corrupt local sheriff in a nearby town. 

It’s absolutely ridiculous and I barely got through it in one viewing. There are wall-to-wall Native Stereotypes throughout. The beautiful Indian Maiden-Reservation Girl. The wise old grandfather. The sweat-lodge and supposed vision quest. The racist white cops. The poor, alcoholic and downtrodden natives. It’s all there…,

I saw everything coming a-mile-away and it got laughable. Jesse of course has sex with Jolene Buckley (Salli Richardson) on a native designed blanket under the mountain that was stolen by the “white man.” Each have perfectly-shampooed-conditioned-long-black-hair too. He also gets age-old wisdom from his grandfather whom he never knew. Jesse even goes into the sweat-lodge and a 3-day vision quest, but doesn’t learn anything. He never plays detective to his mom’s murder either. 

The only redeeming quality is the good cinematography. It captured those flashbacks of Jesse’s mom really well. I expected a compelling murder mystery, but got a cliché-ridden Native American story done a million times before. My Frickin' God!

You can watch the complete movie below from YouTube.

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