The Revolution Will Be Indigenized

by Robert Mendoza

Logline

They lived in the shadows, homeless and undocumented. They found each other, fought for each other, then joined forces to fight for a better world.

Synopsis

Jesse, an angry mixed blood Native Iraq veteran, experiences PTSD on his return to a country that has never treated him as a home. He clashes with his family about the Iraq war and his girlfriend, Brittney asks him to leave. He ends up homeless in Tulsa, OK, living in his truck.
Marco, a young undocumented teen, cannot enroll at OU without a social security card. His father, also undocumented, is afraid that Trump might get elected.
Jesse, searching for answers, reconnects with his mentor, Ben, an older native organic intellectual. He goes to Ben’s study group, where new revolutionary theories are discussed.
Marco’s troubles are compounded when a confrontation with two neo-Nazis tweakers, Stan and Red, at a laundromat leads perversely to the deportation of his family by the police.
Marco’s friend, Maria, a music professor at the local university, has one of her classes cut, then has her house foreclosed. Her daughter, Liliana cries when she finds out.
Marco finds Jesse at a homeless camp. Stan and Red try to recruit Jesse to their cause, but he rebuffs them, earning their enmity. They end up fighting and Marco is slightly wounded. They are helped by Javier, a Chicano man who’s cousin was beat up by Stan.
Jesse meets Maria, at a dance. But he almost gets into a fight and leaves, embarrassed. His tools are stolen and he loses a job. At a soup kitchen, Maria impresses Jesse.
Jesse and Marco run into Stan and Red at a park. They are attacked by Stan and Red, but they leave when they hear police sirens. Marco is shot and killed by the cops when he tries to run away. Jesse finds out that Marco is his son and descends into depression. Maria helps him see a therapist and he is finally able to let his heart break.
Jesse helps a friend, Jamal, who lives on the river bank and whose camp is taken over by Stan and Red. They fight and Stan falls into the river and drowns. Red runs away.They find bomb making parts an AR-15 and maps of black churches in Tulsa. Javier says he will contact the FBI.
Maria invites Jesse to dinner and they get closer. She tells him she is losing her house and that she is undocumented. She asks him to stay over and then she asks him to come to her room. They make love. They decide to develop a community farm on his family’s land.
Jesse’s friends; Maria and her daughter; Ben’s students all work on the farm. Ben, Jesse and Maria find new ways to move forward with their new friends by following the values of their indigenous ancestors, combined with the revolutionary ideas of the Zapatistas, Hardt and Negri, Naomi Klein and others.
Jesse and Maria announce that they are getting married and Ben announces a trip to Standing Rock. They all end up dancing to Ozomotli.
In the last scene, they watch the 2016 election in which Trump wins. It marks a new era, where revolutionary ideas will have a place.

Genre

drama

About this Writer

Tribal Affiliation

Tribe
Maskoke and Purepecha
Tribal Affiliation Type
Enrolled

Union Affiliation

Non-WGA

Literary Representation

Literary Rep
Robert Mendoza

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