Tag: film-oscars

“Our success is one hundred percent down to the fact there’s been very specific and focused investment in Irish language cinema for the last few years; several organisations came together to create an initiative called Cine4, and the whole idea of the scheme was to develop and produce Irish language films. I guess to date our own film is the most successful example of that,” he tells the BBC.

Other Irish language hits that have enjoyed success include a thriller set during the Irish famine, Arracht (2019), and Foscadh (2021), based on a Donal Ryan novel, which were also put forward as Irish nominees for best international feature.

The Oscar nomination of An Cailín Ciúin has given the Irish language a greater cultural platform, as shown by Mescal speaking it at Bafta. “It’s a monumental thing for the Irish language community,” says Bairéad.

“Less than two percent of people in Ireland speak Irish on a daily basis, so when something like this happens, it’s of enormous importance in every sense. On a personal level for myself and other Irish speakers, but also on a political level. Because a language like ours, it needs government support, it needs investment, it needs belief. And projects like this and moments like this are invaluable in that regard.”

Louise Ryan from Screen Ireland, the development agency for the Irish screen industry, believes that Ireland’s current soft power is repayment for a consistency of investment in Irish creative talent.

“It’s testament to taking risks on new talent, but you’ve also got to have the infrastructure, investing in production crews and studios as well as writers and directors. We’ve set up five talent academies and we’ve had stable government support over the last few years, including a Basic Income for the Arts scheme. We’re really seeing the results of all that.

“An Cailín Ciúin is also based upon a novel from a debut author, while Martin McDonagh originally came from the theatre, so we’re seeing crossover in the arts; it’s not just from film, and it makes for a creative hub so you’re seeing talent coming through in all directions,” she tells the BBC.

Whatever happens to the Irish nominees on Oscar night, there’s a sense of a bigger picture “back home” in Ireland, according to best supporting actor nominee Barry Keoghan, who thanked Ireland generally in his acceptance speech when he won a Bafta last month.

“It encourages the arts at home, and we are an island of storytelling, great actors and poets and writers. And it helps the industry massively at home and encourages people to send the scripts in and go for what they want to do.”

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What is true, according to Littlefeather, is that she felt harassed and discriminated against for her speech for most of the rest of her life and career, saying she’d been effectively blacklisted by the entertainment industry. By the end of the 70s, after some small appearances in a handful of movies like Freebie & the Bean and a couple of Playboy spreads, any showbusiness career she might have had seems to have sputtered out. In June last year, the Academy issued Littlefeather a formal apology, and subsequently hosted “an evening of conversation, healing and celebration” with the activist only a month or so before she passed away aged 75 in October. Undoubtedly, the apology was long overdue.

A twist in the tale

Complicating matters further, Littlefeather’s own Yacqui and Apache background has been called into question over the years, most recently in this San Francisco Chronicle piece. If it is to be believed, there are deep-rooted racial and ethical issues attached to Littlefeather and her appearance on stage that evening. If Littlefeather was actually “Pretendian”, as those who falsely claim to be Native American are sometimes called, it may complicate the earnest righteousness of the gesture, and raise questions about how to judge Brando’s choice to use her as his mouthpiece.

However, the facts remain cloudy: the writer of the piece, Jacqueline Keeler, has been challenged on some of her fact-finding by Native American community members, making the identifying of Littlefeather’s heritage a murky proposition.

Adam Piron, the director of the indigenous programme at Sundance Institute, says: “For me, it’s a non-issue to some extent. Whether she was or wasn’t enrolled in the tribes she claimed, she clearly had a lot of acceptance from leaders in our community, who knew about these allegations. The thing that happened with Brando with the Oscars had such an estimable impact in the real world: you’re able to measure what she did in terms of [breaking] the [media] blackout [around Wounded Knee, where the US Justice Department banned journalists], and how that started to change actual policy and legislation around Native Americans because of visibility.”

Considering the text of Brando’s full statement, which Littlefeather was not allowed to read in full on the evening but was later shared with the press, it seems difficult not to see to the heart of the matter:

“It has not been my wish to offend or diminish the importance of those who are participating tonight,” Brando’s full statement said. “Perhaps at this moment, you are saying to yourself, what the hell has this got to do with the Academy Awards? […] the motion picture industry has been as responsible as any for degrading the Indian. When Indian children watch television and they watch films, and they see their race depicted as they are in films, their minds become injured in ways we can never know. If we are not our brother’s keeper, at least let us not be his executioner.”

Fundamentally, questions over Littlefeather’s precise heritage do not lessen the message she delivered ­– and by extension, Brando’s intention to bring awareness to the plight of Native Americans and to their years of insulting and outright racist representation on-screen.

“I think it’s up to indigenous people to decide how they feel about Littlefeather’s heritage,” says Piron. “But because of her actions and the platform Brando allowed this cause to have, there was a measurable impact. […] It was a part of a larger effort that set the stage for everything that was to follow ­– increased activism across indigenous communities, much more awareness from non-indigenous communities of what our rights were. And different federal policies around increased recognition of indigenous peoples’ sovereignty from a legal standpoint, whereas before, the idea of US policy was essentially going to be the termination of the identity of the Native American, so he would just be an American.”

Brando – a remarkable actor and a long-time supporter of civil rights, who took part in the 1963 March on Washington – undeniably had his heart in the right place, and in a very modern one, at that, in his invocation of children, cinema, and representation – and as Piron points out, what he and Littlefeather chose to do made a difference that many outside of the indigenous community may not realise. “It kind of flipped the dynamic of the media blackout and the erasure of what was going on. People were looking away, and this sort of forced people to go and look at it.”

It may be that the behaviour of a few hundred attendees of one of the most exclusive and renowned Hollywood events seems like the stuff of superficial celebrity gossip or tabloid fodder. But it’s clear that such Oscars furores often have more to say than first meets the eye.

It stands to reason, given how audiences are used to projecting values and traits onto film stars. So just as the Will Smith/Chris Rock incident sparked a discourse around racial dynamics, showbiz power, beauty standards, and the acceptability of violence, the Brando/Littlefeather incident has become a litmus test around celebrity activism, political divisiveness in the industry, and the real-world efficacy of making statements from such a platform. Over the years, awards controversies like this one have proved a reliable – if often out-of-left-field – bellwether for the most bruising and provocative subjects in our culture and society at large. Let’s hang on tight for Oscars 2023 and see if anything can top it.

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