CWC Generation Warrior

It is with great pride that Central Wyoming College announces the premiere of Generation Warrior, a timely and powerful documentary about young Natives facing adulthood on the Wind River Indian Reservation. The film will be screened on Tuesday, June 24, 7 p.m. at the Robert Peck Theater. A Q&A with filmmakers and participants will follow the screening.

The film follows the lives of eight young adults from both the Arapaho and Shoshone Tribes over a period of four years. Each participant tells their own story of the challenges they face becoming warriors in a violent and changing world. The participants include Darious Tillman, an Alum of Central Wyoming College, as well as Hudda Curry, Halle Robinson, Taylee Dresser, Gene Trosper, Gabby St. Clair, and Carmen and Matthew Underwood. Jordan Dresser, former Arapaho Tribal Chairman, and Lynette St. Clair, Cultural Preservationist and Language Consultant are Co-Producers of the film. They teamed with EMMY-award winning Producers and Directors Bobbie Birleffi and Jeanne Begley. Professor Tarissa Spoonhunter from the University of Wyoming, Reinette Curry, Director of the UW Native American Cultural Center and Ivan Posey, Wyoming State Legislator, provide analysis and context for the film. 

This project reflects the true spirit of Wyoming when its diverse community comes together: the unwavering support of the Hughes Charitable Trust, a Wyoming Foundation; Wyoming Humanities; and the Wyoming Community Foundation (WYCF), which served as fiscal sponsor for the film. 

One of the greatest supporters of the film was the late Berte Hirschfield whose support was not only financial but rooted in her deep love for the Wind River Indian Reservation. The film is dedicated in loving memory of Berte.

Production Team Background:

Producer Jordan Dresser has served as Co-Director and Co-Producer of the animated short Who She Is; Associate Producer of Home From School: The Children of Carlisle (PBS) and Co-Producer of What Was Ours. (PBS).

Producer Lynette St. Clair has worked as a dialect and language consultant on the Amazon Prime series, “Outer Range;” and the Netflix series, American Primeval. 

Director and Producer Jeanne Begley is an EMMY award-winning Showrunner who brings a clarity of vision to her work with shows like the acclaimed Netflix series Unlocked: A Jail Experiment and Indian Matchmaking.

Director and Producer Bobbie Birleffi, born and raised in Cheyenne, is a veteran producer of non-fiction television. She received an EMMY for a PBS Frontline, Men Who Molest. Daughter of the late, much loved sports broadcaster Larry Birleffi, her first film, Is Anyone Home On The Range, explored the cultural impact of coal and oil development in Wyoming and was nominated for an EMMY.

Wind River’s own Singer-Songwriter Christian WallowingBull provided original songs for the film, while award winning composer Miriam Cutler created the score.

WHY NOW

At a time when our nation’s history is being scrutinized and, in some cases, re-written, and with words like “Native American” being eliminated from government archives, comes a deep and thoughtful new film, Generation Warrior.  

Over a period of four years, 8 young adults from the Wind River Indian Reservation in Wyoming tell their unfolding stories of exploring adulthood.  We see the bravery and resilience of these Native Gen Z-ers as they overcome isolation, loss, and hardship to become warriors with a new kind of warrior spirit, one that will inform the rest of their lives.