This American feature film is the eighth in the Un Certain Regard selection.
Directed by Gina Gammell and Riley Keough, Elvis Presley’s granddaughter, “War Pony” is one of the sensations of this 75th Cannes Film Festival.
An intimate film that immerses the viewer in the lives of two young men from a Native American reservation in South Dakota.
Matho (LaDainian Crazy Thunder), 13, lives with an absent, drug-dealing, and violent father and spends his time hanging out and pretending to be grown up with his group of friends. The other key character in this film is Bill, played by Jojo Bapteise Whiting. At only 23 years old, he is the father of two children from two different mothers, trying to make ends meet as best as he can, but all his professional and personal experiences are marked by failure.
Through these snapshots of life, “War Pony” presents a marginalized society marked by the omnipresence of drugs, poverty, and violence. A sad and infuriating reality, yet it is portrayed with sobriety, without excessive dramatization. The life of this reservation is shown neither in the form of criticism nor with the intention of creating a scandal but rather to highlight an unknown and surreal daily life shared by thousands of people.
