Black Cloud

It was great to see a film with such a beautiful backdrop...it seems all I've seen lately are office buildings in dirty cities, so this was literally a breath of fresh air, and I sort of hated to leave the theater and realize, oops, you're back in the big city now... Rick Schroeder has grown up on film, and we all expect a lot from him. I thought he did a good job with the character, and while the film suffered a bit in pace and editing, it more than made up for that by good performances, cinematography, and a nice score. Hope to see better distribution in the future. This one just didn't seem to have time to catch on with audiences. It made me wish for the old days when you'd see two films at a time, and end up liking the second one better. I guess financial gain for theater owners has taken those days away. Too bad, as some of these smaller films could really benefit from such a system. Anybody listening? Perhaps it will be sold in a two-pack DVD that can benefit another movie at the same time.

I saw this movie last night at the Nashville Film Festival. It was a surprisingly good movie. Young Lakota actor, Eddie Spears, does an excellent job with the lead as "Black Cloud." Russell Means, his boxing mentor "Bud", is wonderful. This movie evokes obvious parallels to the original "Rocky" but has a lot more depth regarding the young man's personal demons and his place within his Native American heritage and the problems of the modern reservation.

The movie is romantic, inspiring, funny and sad and delivers many truths about reservation life and the challenges of Indians who want to rise above the difficulties they face. Rick Schroder's screenplay is very good.

Steve Gainer's cinematography is stunning. There are some wonderful scenes of horses and the outdoor beauty of the Navajo Reservation.

Julia Jones, as Sammi, is convincing and a real cutie.

Country singer Tim McGraw debuts in this film as the Sheriff. He is good in the role.

Some of McGraw's songs are in the movie and, one is delivered very humorously in a Karaoke scene. The end credits roll behind Pat Green's "Wave on Wave."

Schroder is a "bad guy" in this movie and did a convincing job. He revealed he stepped into that role at the last minute because the original choice for the part was a rodeo cowboy with no experience who apparently "froze" when they were trying to shoot his parts.

The acting is quite good even though many of the actors are young and unknown to most audiences.

Rick Schroder was present at the screening I saw. He and Eddie Spears, Julia Jones and Director of Photography Steve Gainer graciously answered questions from the audience following the screening. They all showed considerable class and humility. I was very glad to have been to see the movie and heard the principals discuss their roles more in depth.

Schroder mentioned this movie was made for about a million dollars which is ridiculously low by Hollywood standards. The high quality of the finished movie does not reflect its modest budget and Schroder says that is because it was a labor of love by the participants. It is obvious he is right.

I highly recommend this movie.

I saw this at the Phoenix Film Festival. For a low budget of a million dollars, it was well done.

The story line and dialogue are pretty typical, that being the "overcoming the odds to triumph in the end" movie. A few clichés in dialogue like, "rules are meant to be broken" sprinkle throughout. But the cinematography was good and the fight scenes were the most impressive aspect of the movie. When I looked up IMDB to see who choreographed the boxing, I wasn't surprised to see Jimmy Gambina, who did "Snake Eyes" and was a technical advisor for "Rocky," because of how well done the scenes were. I was surprised, however, that he was on the crew for the film with such a low budget.

Another impressive consideration is that they filmed this movie in something like fourteen days!

For the first movie written and directed by Rick Schroder, it was very well done. Also, this is a good movie for the whole family, minus the violent fight scenes.

This movie is definitely worth seeing. It is a very interesting mix of "Rocky" meets a "Western". A friend of mine saw the film in Montana last week and told me the crowd was blown away as well. I heard they made it for a million bucks. WOW. Tim McGraw is very good as the sheriff. Rick Schroder has ton's of talent as a writer and a big future directing. He was just nominated for a CMA award for best country music video. The girl is hot in the movie. I give it a big thumbs up. Peter Greene is the best I have ever seen him. He was the guy in the mask. Wayne Knight plays a creepy part as a pervert and is totally believable. The cinematography is incredible and the boxing scenes the most realistic I have ever seen.

I saw Black Cloud in Phoenix and liked it very much. Although some people have said the movie contains "stereotypes," I have worked with Indian people over the years and many of them have seen this movie and like it for its fair representation of Indian people in transition from one way of life to another. I heard Russell Means, one of the older Indian actors in the movie, say that he chose to do the script (apparently for not very much money!) because he felt it was an honest depiction of Indian people and the challenges they face. If Indian people are OK with it, I don't know why anybody else should have a problem. I especially liked seeing talented young Indian actors have a chance to show their stuff. I think both Eddie Spears and Julia Jones have great potential, and I hope to see more of them in future. I was impressed with the technical values of the movie--photography and editing, plus the music. For a first-time director, I think Rick Schroder did a terrific job.