Author: Gilbert Guerrero

works by:

Brian Andrews
Marlene Angeja
Miguel Arzabe
Clark Buckner
Reece Camp
Krista Dragomer
Rashin Fahandej
Jamil Hellu
Dana Hemenway
Darrin Martin
Liz Miller
Doug Williams
Gordon Winiemko
Gaby Wolodarski

While working for the  Nicaraguan government filmmaker Johannes Wilm snuck across the border to Honduras in early August to document the resistance movement in the neighboring Central American republic, after a military coup had overthrown Leftist president Manuel Zelaya on June 28th. By coincidence he ended up recording the battle of 3000 students fighting police on the campus of the Autonomous University of Honduras in Tegucigalpa on August 5th. The documentary also investigates the student leaders origins, what their analysis of the current situation is, what plans they have for changing it, and what perspective for the future they see both for them personally and for the country at large.  90 minutes, Spanish with English subtitles.

The State of Nebraska’s refusal to halt alcohol sales to the dry Pine Ridge Indian Reservation from its border town of Whiteclay gets an in-depth look in this documentary about a century-old problem. Four off-sale beer stores in this 14-person hamlet sell over 11,000 cans of beer a day to an Indian clientele with virtually no legal place to drink it. Struggling with crippling poverty and epidemic alcohol abuse that afflicts 4 out of 5 families, the Oglala Sioux Tribe has for decades banned the sale and possession of alcohol on their reservation.

The Battle for Whiteclay follows Indian activists through the streets of Whiteclay to the halls of Nebraska’s State Capitol in their efforts to end alcohol sales in the place many have dubbed “skid row on the prairie.” Here is an inside look at an important contemporary conflict pitting American Indian rights against state and local governments in the United States. 2008, 113min.