Homeland

Four Lakota Indian families face the persistent challenges of contemporary reservation life.

Film Signature Image
Series
True Stories
Premiere Date
November 16, 2000
Length
60 minutes
Funding Initiative
Open Call
  • Award laurels-r Created with Sketch.
    2000 Nashville Independent Film Festival-Best Short Documentary
  • Award laurels-r Created with Sketch.
    2000 AFI Docs Film Festival-Audience Award for Documentary
  • Award laurels-r Created with Sketch.
    2001 Native American Music Awards-Best Instrumental Recording
  • Award laurels-r Created with Sketch.
    2002 Fargo Film Festival-Best Feature Documentary
  • Producer

    Jilann Spitzmiller

    Jilann Spitzmiller works primarily with Hank Rogerson, with whom she made Homeland; Our Youth, Our Future; Bless Me with a Good Life; and worked on the Discovery Health Channel series Medical Diary. Jilann’s past projects include Hecel Oyakapi: They Tell It This Way, produced for actor and activist James Cromwell; a music video for Indigo Girls, which is Show more included in their biographical documentary Watershed; and Thoroughbred Pursuit, a documentary about her father Walt Spitzmiller, a world-renowned sports artist. Jilann is also a cinematographer, writer, and painter. Show less

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    Producer

    Hank Rogerson

    Hank Rogerson works primarily with Jilann Spitzmiller, with whom he made Homeland; Our Youth, Our Future; Bless Me with a Good Life; and worked on the Discovery Health Channel series Medical Diary. His past work includes cinematography on Rocks with Wings, a film about the Navajo Lady Chieftains basketball team and assistant camera work on several films Show more including Surfer Girl, a documentary about the world’s top five women surfers. Hank is also an accomplished actor whose work has appeared on television and in film. His favorite roles include Peter Jones in The Butter and Egg Man, and Pierrot in The Orange Orange. Show less

    Other ITVS Films
    Shakespeare Behind Bars

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    The Film

    Following four Lakota families over three years, Homeland explores what it takes for the Lakota community to build a better future in the face of tribal and government corruption, scarce housing, unemployment, and alcoholism. Intimate interviews with a spiritual leader, a grandmother, an artist, and a community activist from South Dakota’s Pine Ridge Indian Reservation reveal how each survives through family ties, cultural tradition, humor, and a palpable yearning for self-reliance and personal freedom.

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