The title The Incredible 25th Year of Mitzi Bearclaw doesn’t lie. The twenty-fifth year of the titular Mitzi is indeed hard to believe, especially considering that the actress who plays her was closer to 30 at the time. Not that Mitzi (Morningstar Angeline) would be a believable 25-year-old even if she were the right age.
Here is a young woman who makes hats, quite possibly the old-fashioned way; i.e., using the mercuric nitrate that gave rise to the expression “mad as a hatter.” Mitzi tells her boyfriend Ringo Leaves-No-Shadow (Vance Banzo) that she plans to make “life-saving hats,” and later expresses her desire to go to “hat school.” Really. Those are her words. Nobody has the heart to tell her there is no such “school” anywhere, or that “life-saving hats” already exist and are called helmets.
Mitzi must put her pipe dreams on hold when her father asks her to return to the reservation, which she calls “the island of old fools” (when Mitzi arrives there, we see it’s actually called “Owl Island,” population: 308 — although Mitzi’s parents seem to be the only permanent residents). That’s not a very nice way of referring to an indigenous reservation, which is perhaps why, to avoid offending anyone in particular, we never find out exactly to which tribe Mitzi belongs.
Actually, we never really learn much about Native Americans in this movie. If we’re to believe director/co-writer Shelley Niro, the whole experience comes down to arts and crafts — you better believe there’s no shortage of dreamcatchers here — and having visions (or, presumably, hallucinations triggered by the aforementioned mercuric nitrate) in which other Native Americans engage in Star Trek cosplay (among other intellectual properties).
The lack of depth in portraying Native American culture in the movie may be disappointing for some viewers looking for a more authentic representation. It’s a missed opportunity to explore the rich cultural heritage and history of Native Americans. The focus on stereotypes and superficial representations does a disservice to the complexity of indigenous identities.
Anyway, Mitzi completely forgets about Ringo and has eyes only for Honeyboy Yellowdog (Ajuawak Kapashesit). That’s right about the point that I stopped taking this movie seriously, what with all those ridiculous names (and I’m not saying American Indians have ridiculous names, but I do wonder how many Native Americans have names like Honeyboy Yellowdog) constantly reminding me of Fred Ward’s ‘Two Dogs Fucking’ joke from Silkwood.
90% of Everything is Crap 