Dreamkeeper
Dreamkeeper
| 28 December 2003 (USA)
Dreamkeeper Trailers

In South Dakota, in an Indian reservation, an old storyteller Indian asks his grandson Shane, who is in trouble owing money to some bad guys, to take his old pony and him to Albuquerque to the great powwow, an Indian meeting. While traveling, Grandpa tells mysterious Indian tales of love, friendship and magic.

Reviews
Perry Kate Very very predictable, including the post credit scene !!!
Evengyny Thanks for the memories!
BelSports This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.
Cody One of the best movies of the year! Incredible from the beginning to the end.
Donna Barr "This movie lasted three hours?" Hard it believe. It was riveting. Wonderful acting, writing, characterizations. If you loved "Thunderheart," you'll meet old friends in setting and writing. Moving. Sad. Glorious, makes you think. The sparks of comedy are sudden, dry and brilliant; We ere laughing all night over one line: "Go sing it, then." My dad would have loved that line.Gary Farmer as the spider spirit Iktome, with his sidekick Coyote (Warner Brothers lifting him whiolecloth from First Peoples legends) showing us all how NOT to act, are like the sacred clown schticks between the serious dancing:The native/invader images of the old Bad Indian movies are flipped. The older stories are discredited, as they should be, and the real stories come forward. Soldiers and heaps of buffalo skulls become nightmare visions. The images are piercing and clever. The Thunder God is blue as Krishna. A skull and a buffalo robe roll into a young man's protecting spirit. A squashed coyote robe blinks its eye and runs off into the grass. A rock speaks when the photo crew uses nothing but a flashlight beam.The stories are coming back, bringing back their values and lessons. The bad lies about peoples are disappearing, and the sons and daughters of the people who told them don't want them any more. They want the stories, too, because the stories heal.Dreamkeeper is a keeper.
journeyofages I have to comment on Galloway Grumblefield's reply because I'm another white person (20-something male) who share's his/her sentiments and then some. The movie speaks for itself and I'd definitely recommend the miniseries "Into the West" as well which stars some of the same characters from Dreamkeeper. There are no words to describe the emotion that fills within me when thinking about the lives of American Indians. To me they should be regarded as the "super-race" for the sheer fact that they, along with the Buffalo, after being not only marginalized, tokenized, robbed, and yes, decimated almost to literal extinction (remember, even the kids and babies were shot by the U.S. army), they, into the new millennium are still here and their numbers have increased (as of the year 2000 there are about 2 and 1/2 million Native Americans alive today). Of course they're the poorest demographic in the country, worse than that of other minorities, comparatively speaking, and still are facing repression and other forms of harassment and forced relocation by the U.S. government (now empire). The good note is that films such as these shed light on the true nature of the Indigenous American as well as expose the inhumane and inhuman treatment (which exists TO THIS DAY) that they have endured on soil that belonged and by human rights still belongs to them. A progressive people's movement, which already exists, although pathetically fragmented since 9/11, needs to come together and at the center of it needs to be the will of the Native American, even spearheaded and centered around them. Justice needs to finally take its course. There are hundreds of activist websites dedicated to progressing the Indian cause, all a google search away.
smith-an I am very interested in the history of the Native American Indian and I found this DVD to be a profound and moving record. The acting was superb throughout but especially by Eddie Spears, August Schellenberg and an actor I particularly admire Michael Greyeyes. The accompanying music was fantastic. I found the Directors comments about each scene fascinating, especially the information regarding Edward Curtis the well known photographer. I am a photographer myself and could relate to the methods used in the film to create a sepia effect and short depth of field. I know I will Play this film over and over again and each time will find something new.
mijann1972 Yesterday i bought the movie the Dreamkeeper because the little scenes i saw on TV during a commercial interested me a lot. I must say that this story was for sure not a disappointment because it is really a beautiful story which is a mix of fantasy, legends and old stories. In this story a boy from the Lakota Sioux tribe has problems because he has a quilt with an Indian gang. His grandfather wants to visit the powwow, which is a meeting between all kinds of tribes from the USA, in which the dances and traditions will be shared. The grandfather wants that his grandson takes him to the powwow and as reward he will receive a car from his grandfather. In the beginning he don't want that but when he realizes that he also has 1 day to pay the money back to the gang than it maybe could be a good alternative to escape. During the trip his grandfather starts to tell him stories which form the base of the movie. During the stories you enter a time of legends and fantasies but with every story the grandfather is teaching the grandson a lesson in life. The maker of this movie also made Arabian nights and you can see it a little back in this movie because the setup is the same because in Arabian nights a woman tells a movie to the sultan she wants to marry. This story really impressed me and i enjoyed it a lot, also because i am very interested in Indian tribes. This movie deserves a 9 out of 10 because i kept my attention for the full 3 hours it took, in one word beautiful and well done.