About five minutes into Trudell, the 2005 documentary on John Trudell, the American Indian activist turned poet/artist, the doc's subject makes a statement that should pretty much separate the believers from the non-believers in his credo: "The spirit of life is almost non-existent in the perceptional reality of the society that we're in. It's almost non-existent. They got religion; they got civilization, you know; they got the military; they got politics; they got all education; they got all the stuff. They don't have the spirit to live." And they, in case you don't know, is you - if you're not an Indian. That's right; that's what John Trudell thinks of you, dear reader. Aren't you glad he told you that? And all this time, you thought you were working, achieving, striving artistically, being part of families and raising them, believing in your personal religion or not believing in any religion, falling in love, voting, campaigning for your favorite cause, while making a life for yourself and your community. But you weren't, you see. Because your civilization, according to Trudell, is a "lie," and you, by the very nature of who you are, are incapable of living life as you should.

Here are a few examples. Trudell feels the land needs to be taken out of the hands of the "sick minority" that now controls it, and given back to the "people." If you're reading this, I sure hope you don't own your home, or your own business, or any kind of real estate, because you're a party to the general injustice in this country, according to Trudell. Exactly what that injustice entails, of course, Trudell doesn't go into detail about - maybe because he couldn't defend such a ridiculous statement. He also feels "there's no clear thought being exercised in the American public." I don't know about you, but I bet most Americans - regardless of their political orientation - feel that most of their fellow Americans are a generally thoughtful, caring people with a good dose of horse sense included in the mix. I don't believe most Americans buy into the media's - or Trudell's - insistence on a divided country of sensible people on one side, and reckless dolts on the other. Trudell asserts that the majority of Americans supported militant Indians during their heated confrontations with the government in the early to mid 1970s. When two F.B.I. agents were killed at the infamous shoot-out in Oglala, that killed the American Indian Movement push and any marginal support from the public at large - not any shadowy government conspiracy plan that Trudell keeps insisting on. Americans are a pretty fair lot, by and large, and they can recognize quickly when a group - regardless of their cause - crosses over the line into revolutionary politics and terrorism. That's why Timothy McVeigh was executed so quickly in our country (something forgotten by apologists for Islamic terrorists who love to bring up the so-called "Christian" terrorist McVeigh in their morally equivalent arguments). Trudell claims we should be loyal to the Earth, and not to "governing political systems." Naturally, when he expounds further on this idea, the only system of government he mentions is democracy. That's right - your type of government. I guess Trudell thinks China and Syria and Cuba are the answer to the Earth's problems. And on and on it goes in the film.

It's obvious that the film itself is concerned with questionable political and society assumptions (which is fine; that's free speech and democracy - oops, I forgot about that damned evil democracy), which the director, Heather Rae, conveniently leave unchallenged. There are ample opportunities for the director to question Trudell's statements, but she's obviously not interested in providing a rounded portrait. At the beginning of the film, Trudell recounts - with apparent pride -- his family history, including a mention of his Mexican grandfather, who rode with Villa, taking his new bride by force from her Indian tribe. And yet, for the next hour, we hear Trudell listing our civilization's failures, with one of the prominent ones being sexism. Why doesn't the director call Trudell on this obvious (and frankly, sickening) contradiction? The main target of Trudell's ire is the U.S. government, but the state school system he attended as a youth felt he had promise and wanted to help him achieve it (he promptly quit), while the U.S. Navy accepted him and gave him additional opportunities (he said he joined for "survival" reasons, but never adequately explains that). Why doesn't director Rae at least ask him about these inconsistencies?

Laziest of all is the film's refusal to make even the smallest attempt to tackle Trudell's totally unsubstantiated claims of conspiracy and murder. Several times the film mentions the F.B.I. compiling a big dossier on him, and that "they cracked down hard on him" for speaking out. But nowhere in the film does anyone say what that crackdown specifically was. Was he jailed for years? No. Was he shot by government troops? No. Was he forbidden to speak out? Obviously not. So what, exactly, did the government do to him? You'll never know just by watching the film. Equally disturbing, Trudell's racist comments go unchallenged in the film. The words "whites," and "Christians," are thrown around in disparaging ways, but I don't hear anyone saying that's a no-no. When discussing the conviction of murderer Leonard Peltier for shooting two F.B.I. agents at Oglala, the film makes sure to mention in the text that the jury was all white. But when they put up a text card describing the acquittal of Dino Butler and Bob Robideau for the same crime, no mention is made of the juror's race. I guess skin color is only important when the verdict is guilty. Most irresponsible of all is Trudell's assertion that the government somehow was responsible for the arson murders of his family - despite not one shred of evidence to support that claim. The film puts up a little title card to that effect, but it's clear the director supports Trudell's story because we never hear from anyone who discounts that theory.

Trudell's movement into spoken poetry and music albums (after skipping off to Canada for an unexplained reason -- he came back to the good ole' U. S. of A, though) is given short-shrift here, too. We hear his work throughout the film (let's just say it's not my cup of tea, but to each his own), but the director doesn't connect the dots between Trudell's abandonment of vigorous political activism, to becoming another celebrity who hobnobs with other famous singers. Apparently there's no room for irony on Trudell's or Rea's part when you see how "the system" seems to be treating this "victim" fairly well, with lots of record sales, lots of opportunities to speak out against the very country that supports him (try knocking the government in those political systems you like so much, John, and see what happens to you) and plenty of celebrity perks. When you look at the end credits, the first name on the list of donors who funded this movie is Angelina Jolie. Nothing sums up the shallow, limousine-liberal approach of this documentary to serious political issues, than the inclusion of that name in the credits.

The DVDs:

The Video:
The video image for Trudell is clear and focused -- despite the freshman film school method of shooting, you know, some cool stuff in grainy black and white, and, you know, shooting some cool stuff in hand-held camera color, and you know, cool, arty stuff like that. You know?

The Audio:
The stereo audio soundtrack makes the poetry of John Trudell come all too alive for the viewer.

The Extras:
There are no extras for Trudell, but this might be a good place to mention that my DVD of Trudell runs 58 minutes, while most reviews of the film when it first came out, list a running time of 75 minutes. There's no information why there's a discrepancy in the running times, but here, shorter is better, I would assume.

Final Thoughts:
The past treatment of Native Americans by the U.S. Government is a dark, embarrassing chapter in our country's history. And a clear discussion of those issues is always welcome. However, those past injustices in no way excuse the racist rantings of John Trudell. Unfortunately, we live in a time when not all racist speech is labeled as such. The best way to combat this kind of bigotry is to let it air in public, and let the American people see it for what it is. Almost always, fairness wins out in America, however long it may take. It's one of our best traits, and one we're constantly striving to improve. The apocalyptic, dark pessimism and despondency of a John Trudell has no place in most Americans' hearts; we don't believe the system is evil and flawed from the start. He may claim that we're all brainwashed into supporting this deviltry, but most of us know better than that; we give ourselves much more credit for our own intelligence than he does. Civilization and democracy aren't "lies" to us, as they are to John Trudell. They're the frameworks of our lives that we all work at to improve each day -- and I emphasize all of us, regardless of race or religion or political persuasion. John Trudell may have given up on the ideals of America; we won't. Rent it, and see for yourself.