Lily Gladstone (right) plays the aunt of teenage Roki (Isabel Deroy-Olson), whose mother is missing
Native people are extremely vulnerable, and violent crimes committed against them often go uninvestigated,’ says writer-director Erica Tremblay. ‘There’s not a day goes by that I don’t log onto social media and see missing posters. If you look at the statistics… most crimes happen in communities, right? Violence happens within the groups that you live. But 86% of violence perpetrated on Native women is done by non-Native people.’
Making her narrative feature debut with Fancy Dance after directing documentaries and episodes of Taika Waititi’s Reservation Dogs, Tremblay here uses one intimate story to examine the current crisis of missing Natives in America. The setting is the Seneca-Cayuga reservation in northeastern Oklahoma where Tremblay grew up, as Jax (Lily Gladstone), a queer 30-something subsisting on scams, and her 13-yearold niece Roki (newcomer Isabel Deroy-Olson) search for their missing sister/ mum Tawi (Hauli Gray). Their pursuit leads them through a landscape blotted by poverty, crime, drugs and racism.