From The Hollywood Reporter · Etan Vlessing · · 1m 20s
A 1950s relocation promise that broke a family
Marie Clements turns the U.S. Native American Relocation Program into the story of one mother and her three daughters.
In brief
Marie Clements turns the U.S. Native American Relocation Program into the story of one mother and her three daughters. The relocation program sold city jobs and a better life, but it was built to erase Native culture, and families paid for it. Originally reported by The Hollywood Reporter.
Los Angeles has a Native heart
A large urban Indigenous community lives in LA today, and it exists because of a federal policy written seventy years ago.
“Los Angeles is home to a sizable urban indigenous community”
The 1950s relocation push
The U.S. government launched the Native American Relocation Program in the 1950s, moving American Indians off rural reservations and into big cities.
Jobs that were promised
People left home expecting better work and better lives in the city. That promise is what the film puts on trial.
“what they hoped would be better jobs and lives in major cities”
Clements tells it through one family
Canadian Indigenous director Marie Clements builds her drama How We Stand around Angela, a fictional single mother, and her three daughters.
Oklahoma to Los Angeles
Angela's move is the arc of the whole program in miniature, and in the film it ends in tragedy rather than opportunity.
The policy was the point
Racism, sexism and violence hit the family, all flowing from government policies aimed at wiping out Native culture.
“historical U.S. government policies that sought the cultural eradication of native Indians”
The big picture
The relocation program sold city jobs and a better life, but it was built to erase Native culture, and families paid for it.
