[Images] [Site Updates] [How I Became a Fan] [Contact] [Sign Guestbook] [View Guestbook]
In 1942, the Canadian government invoked the War Measures Act to boot the Stoney Point Chippewa community off of its ancestral land on Lake Huron. A training base was built there, with the promise that the land would be returned after the war. The government failed to keep its word, the Stoney Point community got tired of waiting, so in 1993 it took back the base. In 1995, the Stoney Pointers gave notice that they intended to take back their burial grounds in the Ipperwash park. In September of that year, after the park was closed, a group of Stoney Pointers moved in, which led to a confrontation with the police. The Stoney Pointers refused orders to disperse, push came to shove and Dudley George - alleged to be unarmed by most accounts - was shot and killed by police sergeant Ken Deane on September 6, 1995.
It is important to note, for purposes of this review, that the movie is not in any way objective and is not intended to be. It is dedicated to Dudley George (see for yourself in the credits), and right away it dismisses any potential claims of objectivity when in an early scene, Ken Deane is allowed to sidestep courthouse metal detectors and is wished good luck by one of the guards, immediately after which George's brother has to go through the full security routine. Another example: less than 15 minutes into the movie, shortly after the Stoney Pointers rejected the police's first eviction attempt, a cop is shown in the station making racist jokes (his "plan" was to lure the Indians with a few cases of beer, having a net and a pit ready, because "it works down south with watermelon") - and getting no small amount of laughs in response from other cops.
From everything I can gather from the fair amount of Internet research (news accounts, message boards, etc.) I've done on the subject, it's clear that the incident has generated the same level of controversy and argument as the April 1993 storming of David Koresh's Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas. Taking a few looks at message boards from both sides of the political coin, I noted that conservatives paint the Stoney Pointers as gun-toting drunks who were looking for trouble, whereas liberals paint the cops as racist stormtroopers who were thirsting for blood on the night of the shooting. Most news accounts portray the Indians as unarmed but agree that some of the Stoney Pointers were none too shy about provoking the police (even the movie concedes this). I, personally, have no real idea which side to believe, and figure that the truth is probably somewhere between these two versions (TV movies, while often entertaining, are rarely reliable sources of truth).
ROLE DESCRIPTION: Gabrielle plays a senior aide to then-Ontario Premier Mike Harris (who is not portrayed in the movie, but is shown in unflattering clips at the end of the film). Her character is the quintessential combination of ruthless ambition and singularly focused legal positivism, willing to hide behind the law - regardless of potential effect on others- in order to gain her political goals.
KUDOS TO GABRIELLE: This movie was first aired on January 4, 2006, on CTV - well after Gabrielle had become famous to all of Canada as the highly likeable Lacey Burrows in Corner Gas. In this movie, her character is portrayed as a cold-blooded bitch with no sympathy or moral sense who rejects every suggestion of a peaceful resolution or equal time for the seemingly legitimate claim of the Stoney Pointers. This movie is yet another example of why Gabrielle's work impresses me so much - anyone who can play both Lacey Burrows and this political ice queen with equal effectiveness is simply an amazing talent.
Unfortunately, her performance was largely wasted in the movie because Dudley George was portrayed as an indescribably obnoxious, thoroughly unlikable dolt who is completely bereft of maturity, personality and brains. Despite the sympathy I had for the Indians as I was watching the movie, the words "oh, for (bleep)'s sake, would you just shut the hell up" were at the forefront of my mind almost every time Dakota House (who played Dudley George) was on the screen. Gabrielle's role as a bureaucratic bloodsucker would been much effective had it been even remotely possible to sympathize with George himself in the movie. Almost all of the Indians in the movie are extremely sympathetic characters, and had George been portrayed in a similar way, it would have been a perfect contrast to Gabrielle's character and made the effectiveness of Gabrielle's work far more obvious. Instead, George was portrayed as such an ass that it's fairly easy to miss how good Gabrielle was in the movie. Gabrielle basically conducted an acting clinic in the film, and still got overshadowed for no good reason by a self-described "natural-born ---hole" who went above and beyond the call to deserve his title. Since the film is dedicated to the memory of the real Dudley George and is obviously designed to generate sympathy for the Stoney Pointers (and, presumably, for George himself), I am at a complete loss as to why Dudley George was portrayed as the east side of a westbound horse. Only a relative could love, like or even tolerate this guy.
As for Dakota House himself, if he was instructed to turn off viewers by playing the role of a loudmouthed and utterly brainless windbag, then he is one of the finest actors working today. If, however, his job was to generate sympathy for the real Dudley George, then he should be thrown out of the Screen Actor's Guild (or at least denied membership for life) on general principle. In all seriousness, it's honestly hard to tell which is actually the case here. Examples of obnoxiousness are everywhere in this movie. When George's brother is reading him last rites, it's actually easier to sympathize with the brother than it is with the doomed gunshot victim. George is even annoying when he comes back from the dead at the end of the film. If you think I'm exaggerating, just watch the movie.
In any case, it's really a shame that such a good performance by Gabrielle was so senselessly overshadowed, but if you're a fan of Gabrielle's you won't regret watching this movie, regardless of your political stance or your personal take on Ipperwash.
NOTE: In what many might consider to be just desserts, Ken Deane - who, whether he deserved to be convicted or not, got an astonishingly light slap on the wrist for a negligent homicide conviction (not a day behind bars and nothing more painful than 180 hours of community service), was killed in a car accident on February 25th, 2006, just outside of Prescott in eastern Ontario. He was 45.