This film is very powerful since it delves into all the horrific traumas that Native kids went through at boarding schools everywhere in the States, not just in Minnesota. This one should take the blinders off of every white person who thinks that Indians "have always had it easy" or "good"!! Viewers of this film should realize the horror of these death camps that were disguised as "boarding schools"! Many children died at the hands of the priests, nuns and all the other school personnel. I strongly suggest watching this for anyone who dislikes Native people for their "bad qualities"; the ones who think that Natives are only "one of society's many problems". You'll know what I'm talking about after watching it. I hope the film will literally open your eyes and see the truth! That's why this film was released, to make the public aware of the atrocities that occurred. ANYWAYS...that's why I gave this a 9 out of 10.

When I arrived in Riverside, Ca. In 1970 I was appalled to learn that young Native Americans were forced to live @ a boarding school there! Away from their families, these children attended Sheridan Indian School without the benefit of their Native language OR cultural teaching! This film portrayal is a small glimpse into this injustice & the impact it had on innocent victims of our government's ignorance! Watch this if you can stomach the TRUTH!

The story of American Indian boarding schools needs to be told. In the past Indian children were taken from their parents, often forcibly, and put into highly-regimented schools designed to eradicate all signs of their "savagery." Use of Indian languages in these schools was forbidden and harshly punished.

This movie probably should have been a "period place" showing the experiences of an Indian child thrust into the soul-killing world of the boarding school. Perhaps it was feared this approach would limit the size of the audience. In any case we get a modern-day story, set in northern Minnesota, in which a boarding school is glimpsed only occasionally in brief flashbacks. Surrounding these flashbacks lies a plot cluttered with a bewildering number of elements: the arrogance of the Catholic Church, shock treatments, commercial development of sacred Indian lands, an election for mayor pitting a white man against a red man, gambling casinos, a love story, hallucinations and visions, family secrets leading to tensions, a bizarre crucifixion-style murder, etc. There's even a subplot involving a geologist investigating earthquakes! All this clutter is unnecessary and self-defeating because the story which the movie wants to tell is strong enough as it is. It doesn't need to be "packaged" with elements which tend to detract from it rather than enhance it.