Songs My Brothers Taught Me

IMDb RATING

7.0/10

YOUR RATING

Irene Bedard, John Reddy, Jashaun St. John, and Kevin Hunter in Songs My Brothers Taught Me (2015)

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Drama

Two siblings living on Pine Ridge Reservation face challenges after their father's death. The brother considers leaving for LA, but it would mean separating from his beloved sister.Two siblings living on Pine Ridge Reservation face challenges after their father's death. The brother considers leaving for LA, but it would mean separating from his beloved sister.Two siblings living on Pine Ridge Reservation face challenges after their father's death. The brother considers leaving for LA, but it would mean separating from his beloved sister.

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

7.0/10

YOUR RATING

See production info at IMDbPro

Awards
- 10 wins & 11 nominations

Trivia
On a DVD extra, director Chloé Zhao said of the tight budget, light plotting, and neo-realist style casting, "We're capturing truth - because truth is the only thing we can afford." The production used mostly local residents as actors, and, according to Zhao, 80% of the story depicted is true to the actual life of the young man playing Johnny Winters (John Reddy). The house that Winters lives in is the house that Reddy lived in, and Reddy, also one of 25 children to one father, has many of his real family members playing members of his family. In fact, the man shown delivering the eulogy for Winters' father is Reddy's actual father.

Goofs
1:25:33 boom drops into shot.

Quotes
Johnny Winters: Where we live, the Plains, the Badlands, things usually look the same. People are always related. They got the same old worries all the time. It gets really hot sometimes. You get tired of it, but there's things you always gotta do. It's always a hard place to leave. 'Cause that's all you got growing up. My sister, Jashaun, she's got a thing about this place. She sees things I don't. She's a good one. Whenever the storms are comin', the old timers would teach us to watch the cloud. And when the wind is too strong, we all know to lean into it so it don't blow us away.

Connections
Referenced in Hive (2021)

Soundtracks
Thrift Shop
Written by Macklemore & Ryan Lewis
Performed by Macklemore & Ryan Lewis feat. Wanz
Courtesy of Macklemore LLC
Under license from Inside Passage Music

User reviews25

Review

Featured review

9/10

Beautiful debut and most underrated film at Sundance

The first 45 minutes or so of Songs might fool you into thinking you're watching another well-made, indie Sundance movie. Good, but nothing special.

And then as if by magic, the movie sucks you into its universe. Seemingly disjointed pieces of story start blending together to create a beautiful whole, a story full of despair and of hope, of ugliness and beauty. It floats like a butterfly and stings like a bee, eschewing political or social commentary for a poetic, equally effective approach. A story of brotherly love in a stunning and tragic landscape.

I'm not ashamed to say the final moments brought tears to my eyes. Beautifully shot, understated but powerful, SONGS is a really impressive, mature debut, and should be on your watch-list for this year.