Out of a simple idea came a video that has touched thousands

It started out as a simple idea.

So simple that anyone could pick up a camcorder, film and post it on the Internet.

But months since its February debut, the simple video, ‘Indians Smiling,’ has taken some big turns and made its way right into the arms of National Public Radio.

The four-and-a-half minute video, directed by Ryan Red Corn, Osage, and Sterlin Harjo, Seminole and Creek, features the brighter side of Native Americans, where actual Native Americans are filmed smiling for the camcorder. The video is in contrast to the idea that Native Americans only wear a stoic and serious look.

Red Corn and Harjo said it took them about two years to complete the project, but even for them that was two years too long, considering the simplicity of the idea.

“I can’t believe it was such a simple idea,” Harjo said. “However long we’ve had video cameras nothing like that’s ever been made.”

But now it has and it’s making a whole lot of people smile.

Both Harjo and Red Corn had ideas to produce a similar video years before but they never got around to it.

Eventually they revisited the idea and started shooting the video last year.

Harjo shot at the Santa Fe Indian Market in Santa Fe, N.M., and in Tulsa, Red Corn shot his video at a powwow and in his hometown of Pawhuska.

They both started filming last summer and finished the product this year.

It was as simple as film, edit and post. But Red Corn said when he saw the final product he realized how big of an impact such a simple idea could make.

“I could tell it was going to be pretty, it was going to be beautiful, I don’t think I anticipated the deeper impact it had, the feeling that you walk away from it, if there’s anything that took you by surprise it was probably that,” he said. “I watched it about 20 times in a row, your face just starts hurting from watching it so many times.”

The title alone gives away the feel-good kind of video but there are many underlining messages in it.

The video has smuggled its way into classrooms, offices and into the minds of naysayers who believe Native Americans can be anything but humorous.

Red Corn said the video portrays a very important fact – Native Americans do smile, and laugh and know how to have a good time, despite whatever popular textbook photos by Edward Curtis show.

Curtis was known for his photography of Native American people in the late 1800s and 1900s. His photographs frequently appear in textbooks of young students; elementary to college, and show only stoic Native Americans.

“It’s there to combat the Edward Curtis photos in everybody’s textbook . . . what this has done is it’s made its way into classrooms where these picture are shown,” Red Corn said. “Pieces like this is what becomes classroom debates.”

And that’s what artists like Red Corn and Harjo like.

Red Corn said soon after the video launched and the NPR piece aired, there was already a lot of talk about the film.

He said on NPR’s web site, readers and listeners commented on the story saying Indians were “drunk and lazy” and other degrading things, which is why Red Corn said it’s important to rid textbooks of Curtis’ images, or at least show the other side.

“It (the negative comments) proved my point I guess, which was that Curtis images still dominate the American psyche,” he said. “Just through that content up there…that shows if you’re not pissing somebody off you’re probably not doing something right.”

The video also has plenty of positive messages that come with it.

Harjo said Native Americans have plenty of past documentaries made about them and the atrocities they’ve been through, but he wanted the video he and Red Corn made to show that it’s not all heartbreak and tears anymore.

“I wanted people to be exposed to the other side of that, people smiling also give people a sense of hope,” he said. “That’s what laughter and humor does, it gives hope . . . a little bit of it is to inspire younger people.”

So far, aside from the negative comments on the NPR Web site, the two have gotten a lot of positive feedback.

With such hype and praise for the video Red Corn said it just goes to show that the need for more Native media is there.

Though the video was a small, simple project, it has made an impact and has stirred up conversation, it’s important not to forget the positive idea that started it all.

“One big part of the video was that we put our friends in it and that was fun to do, people that we love, people that we care about, people that we know that we even put our daughters in it,” Harjo said. “Indian people want to see people having fun and smiling . . . it’s just showing Indian people being humorous, laughing, it’s just a simple idea.”

To view Red Corn's video visit http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ga98brEf1AU