http://blogs.indiewire.com/shadowandact/and-the-winner-of-round-2-of-the-inaugural-shadow-act-digital-filmmaker-showcase-is

Or read on here:
Tara J. Ryan (Chickasaw/Choctaw) is President and Owner of Tijer Lily Co, Tara brings a fresh approach to Native American Entertainment. She holds a Bachelor of Science in Marketing and Business Administration with honors, awards and many specializations including studies of the South American, Central American and Caribbean peoples, writing in all styles (Business, Creative, Script, etc.) and video production. She is a contributing writer and Advisory Board member for NativeVue Film & Media, with many of her pieces being carried by the Native Times, America’s largest, independently-owned Native newspaper and many other artistic publications.
Her efforts having been recognized both within and beyond her Native community for an exceptional entrepreneurial spirit and a cutting edge creative style, she never stops working to find new and better ways to accomplish her goals and those of her clients. Working with the finest managers, agencies, talent, and Native organizations throughout the US and Canada, she brings the experience of nine years of work specializing in Native American Entertainment and Media to every project.

Thank you Tara.

http://www.shadowandactfilms.com/FilmmakerShowcase/survey.html

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http://www.facebook.com/ShadowAndActDigital?sk=app_208195102528120

Peace and Happy New Year,
Special Boy Films

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Contemporary Native American Music – Native Folk & Blues Rock. 
Native folk & blues rocker  Keith Secola is an accomplished artist: award-winning musician, master guitarist and native flute player; singer, songwriter, composer and producer. His music is familiar to thousands of fans across North America and Europe, where he’s been playing his brand of progressive music in concerts to a cult following for many years. Keith’s famous song, “NDN Kars”, is considered the contemporary Native American anthem and is the most requested song on Native radio in the US and Canada. Keith Secola is Anishinabe (Ojibwa) originally from the Mesabi Iron Range country of northern Minnesota, now residing in Arizona.  He’s a member of the Anishinabe Nation of northern Minnesota and southern Ontario, Canada.

Keith Secola is a seven-time Native American Music Awards winner receiving numerous Nammy nominations in various categories. Winner: Artist of the Year, Best Linguistic Recording, Best Folk/Country Recording, Best Producer, Best Instrumental Recording, Best Blues/Jazz Recording, Best Independent Recording; with nominations for Songwriter of the Year, Record of the Year, Song/Single of the Year, Best Historical Recording.

Over the past several weeks most of you have heard that some guy wants to shoot a film in your community, and moreover, wants to cast it entirely with people FROM your community. Some of you have been immediately receptive to the idea, and for that I thank you. It means a lot.

More than a few though have had questions. Most often:

“Who are you?”

“What are you doing here?”

“Why are you telling this story?”

and, probably more often than any other one:

“Is this for real?”

These questions are something I’ve come to understand and appreciate. After all, it’s not often that someone comes into your community without a desire to take something from it.

The truth is, this film has been over five years in the making, and started the day I got the call that Duane Meat was no longer with us. Many of you know Duane and some of you may not, but I think it suffices to say that he was a true Anishinaabe, a brilliant man who cared about his people and envisioned a future when Leech Lakers, White Earthers, Cass Lakers and Red Lakers could all point to a better future for themselves and their children, one in which all of the people had a voice, the means, and will to use it. What he envisioned was truly beautiful. And part of that vision was media, movies and film. He would always say to me: “We should go back and do something on the rez.”

I would always agree, and then we would go do something else-usually go play video games. This is what it was like while we were at Harvard together, insulated from the world. Change could wait. But we waited too long.

Fast forward to May of 2006. Duane was killed by a Sureño in Minneapolis. He was on his way back to Harvard the next semester to finish his degree in Economics and return to the rez.

Most of you know the story by now, and most of you know what he meant and means to Leech Lake. What you probably don’t know is that thousands of miles away, his passing lit fires under a lot of people. I was one of them.

A few weeks after Duane passed I had an interview at NYU Film School. It’s a foreboding place that looks something like the interior of the Deathstar, and I was nervous. After all, this was the place that Spike Lee and Scorsese, Oliver Stone and Ang Lee graduated from. But when I got into the interview room a sudden calm came over me when they asked me what film I wanted to make. Many things I didn’t know, but that one was crystal clear: this one-the film that would honor my friend.

And here we are.

The film I envisioned is a longer film, probably two hours, and it’s something that we’re developing right now. This film, about twenty-five to thirty minutes long, is the film we need to make to get to that film.

This film is not about Duane.

Rather, it’s about the young people that I’ve met in Leech Lake, and Minneapolis, people that Duane talked about when he told me stories from home, the people he devoted so much of his vision and plan to. These are strong and proud Anishinaabe, people who have not bowed even under tremendous pressure, and tremendous pain.

Pain itself has a way of taking on a life of its own, and becoming more than the sum of its parts. A large part of the pain I have felt in Cass and on the rez is that the outside world is content to pretend that this pain, and the people that go along with it, do not exist.

I don’t find this acceptable.

This film is about a main character, Daniel, who is dealing with the loss of his older brother while doing his best to be a surrogate father for his niece. He reads her bedtime stories, tries to teach her the old ways and works hard. But it is not enough. He loses his grip on his family’s trailer, and with it his last real link to their memories.

This character sets out on a journey to get this trailer back, but more than that he sets out to find some semblance of family, someone he can count on. One of the groups that attempt to offer him that sense of family is a gang.

Many people have commented on the inclusion of a gang in a movie about the rez. Some have noted that they’d rather gangs not be discussed, others that they wished the issue of gangs would be discussed more.

To this I would say that Rez is not a film about gangs. There are no drive bys or shootouts, no robberies or killings. Rather, the main character’s cousin happens to be in a gang, and offers this lifeline to his cousin, not as gateway to criminal enterprise, but rather as a group of people that look after one another.

When offered this choice the main character turns away from this cousin. He seeks help in other places. He seeks help in the form of work. He also seeks help in the form of Saundra, his girlfriend. She is a girl from tract. She is also a girl who is headed off to college. She is another of the untold stories: tales of the courage that it takes to leave everything you know for something else, go out into the unknown. It is a tale I’ve heard from many who’ve left Cass Lake and gone away and come back.

These are subjects we hope to explore more deeply in the feature length project, and for now are only touched on in the short film. It is not perfect. Not even close. But it has not been written without the consultation and advice from both elders and those in the younger generations, and it if it is not perfect, it is not for lack of effort or dedication. But it is good. Good enough that Spike Lee read the script and agreed to donate some of his hard-earned cash to help get it made.

Even still, one thing is for certain:

Some of you will like the film.

Some of you will not.

This is something I wish I could change. But I can’t.

In the end, all I can ask is that even if you end up in the latter group, I hope you see the message behind every frame. And that message is:

YOU MATTER. YOU ARE IMPORTANT.

and more than that:

YOU ARE SPECIAL.

I have been to many places on the earth, and very few of them feel like Cass Lake and the surrounding area. It is a place that is alive, and it is a place where I’ve seen miracles happen firsthand.

And all I can keep thinking is:

Duane was right.

In the coming weeks, we’ll be holding more casting sessions on Leech Lake, in Bemidji and in the cities to find and promote local talent. If you are interested in being a part of the film, please e-mail me with your picture and the part that you’re interested in at casting@specialboyfilms.com or message me here.

***If you’ve already auditioned and not gotten an e-mail from us, please e-mail me again-it is because we can’t read your e-mail address.

Please message me also if you’re interested in being part of the crew, and check http://www.facebook.com/pages/Rez/249811005043241 for updates on where we’ll be shooting, what we’re up to, and where the film is in terms of its progress to completion. You’ll also be able to comment and give feedback on clips of the movie as they’re finished and posted.

We hope you’ll continue to support Rez and the movement we’re hoping to start. There are important, beautiful stories here, and it’s time to start telling them.

Sincerely,

Dominique DeLeon

August 9, 2011