Smoke Signals

Smoke Signals is a road movie with an acid sense of humor and a heritage-ridden theme that’s as universal as it is specific.

Smoke Signals may be the most delightfully quirky surprise of the summer, a shaggy-dog tale that from its opening moments... portrays the Native American legacy of pride and pain with deep emotion, grace and irreverence.

It is a warm film of friendship and reconciliation, and whenever it refers to historic injustices or contemporary issues in Native American culture, it does so with wry, glancing humor. Smoke Signals is indeed poignant, but above all it's pretty funny.

I can't think of a recent movie that packs more provocative fun into less than ninety minutes.

A light, entertaining treatment of serious themes that speaks with a distinctive, unusual voice and instinctively pulls back from the temptation to be solemn and pretentious.

The plot is episodic, hardly surprising in light of its origin as a series of short stories. But the performances are convincing, with Beach and Adams making a credible odd couple.

[Sherman] Alexie’s screenplay is full of modest but vivid details and first-time director Eyre has an almost effortless touch in getting them on the screen with an easy mosaic-like mix of snapshots of life on the Rez and on the road mixed.

Hollywood’s first Native American feature is this charming perspective-reorienting dramedy.

It’s the first feature film for director Chris Eyre, and his young leads are relative newcomers to the big screen, but their energy and the freshness of their point of view overcome any rough spots.

Eyre and Alexie also open doors yo the reservation, exposing the tragedies as well as the whimsy, and gleefully skewering every cliché about Native Americans that Hollywood has ever perpetrated.