2023 LASF Film Guide

A

• American Psycho Theres a new Patrick Bateman in town and she needs to quench her murderous appetite before dinner reservations at Dorsia. See Details

B

• Bad Press When the Muscogee Nation suddenly begins censoring their free press, a rogue reporter fights to expose her government’s corruption in a historic battle that will have ramifications for all of Indian Country. In partnership with See Details
• Be Good, Stay Safe An Indigenous college student who shows up at her best friend Molly’s house for a study session turned Halloween house party of which Lucille wasn’t aware. As she enters the house, Lucille sees the Deer Lady standing in the midst of the party, but she... See Details
• Broadcasting Native Voices: Mary Jean Robertson Mary Jean Robertson has been a native voice on the airwaves in San Francisco for 50 years. Mary Jean shares why it is important for Native people to have space and how she works to amplify native voices through her radio show. See Details
• Burning Of The Gods An airplane lands. A massive cruise boat anchors off the reef, disgorging tourists for tropical island vacations. This postcard paradise depends on petroleum imports to fuel its cars, motorbikes, boats, hotels, pumps and machinery. Yet if the tourists stopped coming, what then? The film opens... See Details
• Butterfly/Bataply Raya loves makeup but her family does not. She’s torn between her secret dream of being a makeup artist and her family’s strict religious beliefs. In a nightmare, she receives a profound message from her Papua New Guinean ancestor who encourages her to look at... See Details

C

• Camping “Camping” follows the story of Emma, an African American working homeless mother, and her 7-year-old daughter Gia, who live in their van. Emma works as a rideshare driver and struggles to make ends meet. One night, they take on their most difficult passenger yet, Jen,... See Details
• Chubby Cree: PiMahCiHoWin A young boy uplifts his community with the powerful medicine in his voice. See Details

D

• Dating Indian Tara is happy she can finally bring a Native boyfriend home to her family, only to find out the night before that he’s not really Native. See Details
• Dear John An indigenous woman pitches her song, “Dear John” for the live action Pocahontas. See Details
• Decolonizing Data An animation project created in collaboration with the Seattle Indian Health Board, to raise awareness of utilizing digital data to preserve cultural knowledge and information. See Details
• Destiny’s Lines Destiny struggles with ways to honor her ancestors, when she chooses the draw chin tattoos, she gets pushback from the school. With her Mom’s encouragement, she will start a journey to get more kids involved to represent their culture and honor their ancestors. See Details
• Do Digital Curanderas Use Eggs In Their Limpias? A struggling Latinx healer considers abandoning the physical world for promises of a digital utopia. See Details

E

• Ephemera A two-spirit male cruises a hook-up app as he looks for companionship for the night. A welcomed familiar person invites him over as he contemplates his existence, the future and what it means to be who he is in this day in age. See Details
• Epiphany Dream A twenty something woman is down on her luck. However when her meddling mom signs her up for barber college behind her back, she begins to question if her luck has changed. See Details

F

• Figure It Out: AFP and Depression In this short documentary, award-winning indie filmmaker Mike J. Marin (Navajo/Laguna Pueblo/Washoe) invites us into his struggle with trauma and depression and how the growing art of action figure photography saved his life in the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic and how this new... See Details
• Four Nights and a Fire A young Ojibwe photographer stubbornly takes on the responsibility of keeping a sacred fire alive for four consecutive days and nights in mourning of his father. His father’s spirit tries to reach him from the other side. See Details
• Frybread Face and Me It’s 1990. Benny is a Native American boy growing up in San Diego who plays with dolls and listens to Fleetwood Mac. Everything Benny thinks he knows about himself and his family is turned upside down when his parents force him to spend the summer... See Details

H

• Healing of the Dragonfly Meet Joe Pulliam, an Oglala Lakota Sioux artist living in Rapid City in the state of South Dakota. Father of 4, Joe Pulliam opened an art gallery exclusively with his work, painting on ledgers inspired by his culture and traditional life. This documentary tells his... See Details

I

• If I Ever Get Out of Here After waking up alone in a forest and determined to find a way out, a young Native artist finds company in a mysterious voice on the other end of a walkie-talkie as she is tormented by an ominous hooded monster. See Details
• Indigenous Resistance: Now and Then We explore how it was for our people to go through statehood, blood quantum, ANCSA, boarding schools, stripping our language and dance away, and all that has done to our mental health. With that, we try to have a hopeful spin on this narrative and... See Details
• Isolation After her relationship fails, Nabaahii catches Covid-19 and finds herself forced to return to the Navajo Reservation from college. See Details

K

• Kachinas in Space A Native man on a distant plane finds a mysterious helmet. See Details
• KA ʻĀʻUMEʻUME: NAVIGATING HOME Six Kānaka ʻŌiwi (Native Hawaiians) share their voyages in and out of diaspora. Their collective moʻolelo (story) wades through hope, grief, wisdom, and the effects of the illegal occupation of their homeland. They share the pull they have felt to return to Hawaiʻi and ka... See Details

L

• The Latina Book Club A group of Latinas come together to create a space of their own only to find they discover more about themselves. See Details
• Letters to our Ancestors In the heart of downtown Los Angeles (Gabrielino-Tongva land), “Letters to our Ancestors” details how American Indian and Alaska Native organizations are working to preserve and restore Indigenous cultural identity as the foundation of well-being and healthy development. We witness the amazing impact that Indigenous... See Details
• Liberty of Jewels Gilbert Etsitty, a financially strained Navajo father, works in Gallup, New Mexico as a clerk for Jeff’s Trading Post. He is tested by his employer, Jeff, who is a manipulative boss that forces Gilbert to gain autonomy for the survival of his daughter’s relationship. See Details
• Living Weaving A celebratory 10-minute documentary on Musqueam weaver Debra Sparrow, her reclamation journey, her family, and her identity. See Details
• Lucky Man Highs and lows, snapshot tragedy. A look into the life of a man on the edge.  See Details

M

• Memere Mémère follows the story of a devoted grandson’s fluke opportunity to take his Grandmother on a trip down memory lane. See Details
• Meneath: The Hidden Island of Ethics Meneath: The Hidden Island of Ethics dives deeply into the innate contrast between the Seven Deadly Sins (Lust, Gluttony, Greed, Sloth, Wrath, Pride and Envy) and the Seven Sacred Teachings (Love, Respect, Wisdom, Courage, Truth, Honesty and Humility), as embodied in the life of a... See Details
• MONSTR How do you go on living when everything is taken from you in the blink of an eye? A young artist confronts his inner demons while apprenticing with a northwest totem carver after the death of his beloved. See Details
• More Bounce More Bounce documents three Samoan men as they retell their journey of being bouncers in Southern California. As the men reflect on their experiences, they recall the ways in which the job often confronted them with violence, but also made way for them to forge... See Details
• My Brother Stunning Hawai’i backdrops frame this touching drama about a Tongan brother and sister at rugby practice. Recovering from a recent injury and rejected from another University, Alofa is ready to give up. Meanwhile, her brother Malu races against time to encourage his sister and pass... See Details
• My Whole Healthy Life – Meet Wa.Sta.Tse Meet Wa.Sta.Tse and her family! Within their Native American community, they do many things to care for and support each other in being healthy, relaxed, and centered. Staying healthy isn’t just about going to the doctor! See Details

N

• Nahual When Victoria, a young and immature artist, assumes guardianship of her little sister after the death of their mother, she must fend off a mysterious creature during a CPS visit or risk losing her sister forever. See Details
• Nihtâwikihew / ᓂᐦᑖᐃᐧᑭᐦᐁᐤ / she gives birth Sâkowêw is a young woman in a remote community who just wants to welcome her new baby safely into the world. She trusts Auntie Mary to honour her family’s traditions. When something goes wrong, she’s snatched from warmth and safety, and spirited away to a... See Details
• Not Afraid After a blow-up during basketball practice, Olivia struggles to face a deeper devastating reality in rural Montana. See Details

O

• O’odham Su:dag- The People’s Water Welcome to “O’odham Su:dag – The People’s Water,” a powerful short film by Indigenous Filmmaker Jasmine Lopez; sharing a profoundly personal and eye-opening account of her upbringing on the South Side of Tucson, where access to clean water was scarce, and its profound impact on... See Details
• Ooxono (From Here) This film by Isaac Michael Ybarra (Tongva, Chumash, Chicano), juxtaposes visual themes of decolonial cultural preservation and urban/invasive infrastructure. Ooxono (From Here) is a short poem pushing back against the use of the term Urban Native within the context of Tovaangar (Los Angeles) and the... See Details

R

• Rabbit Stories – ᏥᏍᏚ ᏗᎧᏃᎮᏢᏅ Rabbit Stories is a Cherokee series that captures the essence of Cherokee culture and entirely in the Cherokee Language. This show is made possible by the Cherokee Nation, and the talented Cherokee cast, which includes the renowned academy award winning Wes Studi, who is nothing... See Details
• Radio Bingo To help revitalize the Mohawk language, a local reservation radio station incorporates the Mohawk language into a game of Radio Bingo. See Details
• Redlights An evening out takes a dramatic turn for two Indigenous women, Tina and Amber, when Amber is suddenly taken into police custody. Fearing the worst, Tina tails the cruiser outside city limits and makes a courageous choice to free her friend. See Details
• Remember Native youth learn a valuable lesson about technology and connecting with culture. This production is part of the LA SKINS FEST Native Youth Media Workshop in collaboration with 7 Generations at United American Indian Involvement. See Details
• Rescuing Tar Creek: Water Protector Rebecca Jim Tar Creek, located in Northeastern Oklahoma, is one of the most heavily-polluted waterways in the United States. As a lifelong environmentalist, Cherokee Nation citizen Rebecca Jim has devoted her life to cleaning up Tar Creek by holding Cherokee values and her kinship with the land... See Details
• River Bank (Pō Kehgeh) A Tewa woman struggles with guilt after stealing money from a local business. Her grandmother takes her to the River to remind her of Tewa values. The Tewa woman blesses herself with River water, and the River becomes her guide. Together, they give to the... See Details

S

• Sahnish Survival Camp This is a story about Whirlwind Bull Yellow Bear, and his quest to reconnect young boys and girls to their indigenous roots of living off the land. While relearning what it is to be independent in today’s society of fast paced living and technology. See Details
• Snack On a night out with friends, Jess briefly opens up about the grief she’s continuing to process in the aftermath of her grandfather’s death. She decides to go home early and while rummaging around in the kitchen for something to eat, startles her grandmother and... See Details
• Spirit Girl A beautiful and haunting music video about First Nations Missing and Murdered Woman. No one deserves to leave this life that way. It is dedicated to my Auntie Roseanne, who was murdered and thrown into the Bow river See Details
• Starbound Starbound is a short sci-fi/ family drama that explores the return of eight year old Billy Campbell after being abducted by aliens four years earlier. See Details
• Stay on the Path Black-Native sister duo Lindy Vision work on new music for an upcoming album, while struggling to find balance in their home and concert life. Lindy Vision is a local new wave/synth-pop band in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Dorothy and Natasha Cuylear make up the Black-Native (Jicarilla... See Details

T

• Tala’s Bedtime Story After having a nightmare about his grandfather, Tala looks to his mother for answers. She recounts a tale about Tala’s grandfather and how he got his name. In this tale, she tells him about his grandfather’s friend, a monkey named Susie, and their journey to... See Details
• Tell Me About Boarding School Shima Sani A Documentary short about a Firsthand Boarding School Survivor staring Vera Murphy, out of Crownpoint, NM. She is a first-generation student in her family along with many brothers and sisters. Sharing some her Boarding School Experiences in the New Mexico region. Having a deeper understanding... See Details
• Temperance Frank a couple months sober attends his friends going away party. See Details
• Terror/Forming Set over the course of one evening, Parker and his boyfriend, Darren, find themselves detoured on their trip and going towards Parker’s late kokum’s cabin. The men make a disturbing discovery which creates tension within the pairs already unhealthy relationship. Shot in one continuous take,... See Details
• Through My Eyes A Navajo man reflects on his cultural identity while interacting at the Bosque Redondo Memorial–a Navajo incarceration camp in Fort Sumner, New Mexico. David Henderson is a full blood Navajo man who was raised by a loving white family after his biological mother died giving... See Details
• The Tomahawk An indigenous Canadian scout meets a young German soldier in the snowy forests of Europe during the Second World War. See Details
• Two Worlds A father and daughter search for their missing loved one on the Salt River Indian Reservation. See Details

U

• Unless You Have Been There Kristen and Gabe share the same home yet live on opposite ends of security and oppression. See Details

W

• Weaving a Legacy: Ella Mae Blackbear Ella Mae Blackbear was named a Cherokee National Treasure in 1990 in basketry. We explore how her legacy lives on in the lives of those who knew her and others who are still studying her work today. See Details
• Woman Who Blooms At Night Eve, a young Native woman disconnected from her tribe, longs for more than the confines of her home and her abusive boyfriend, Sid. She decides to volunteer at her tribe’s cultural center, where she begins to find out who she truly is. With this, Eve... See Details
• Work is Ceremony A short dance film exploring the love of Rick Bartow and Julie Swan. See Details

Z

• Zombies Don’t Eat Stupid People In a world with Zombies, a dysfunctional zombie control task force is the last line of defence. Let by the well-intentioned Captain Chris, his bumbling team is charged with investigating and containing zombie outbreaks. See Details