Smoke Signals

(Miramax)

The first feature film conceived, written, directed, and (mostly) acted by Native Americans, Chris Eyre's picture from a sublime screenplay by novelist/poet Sherman Alexie is sweet and funny, and also fearlessly emotional, as it tracks the bitter Victor (Adam Beach) on his journey from an Idaho reservation to Phoenix to claim his father's body -- a road trip that becomes, of course, a mythic pilgrimage, a psychic journey.