Win or lose: 'Rez Ball' weaves the trials, triumphs of Native American culture together

“Rez Ball” is more than just a game.

It is an experience of resilience and unity in the Native American culture. The movie, which was filmed in Albuquerque, Santa Fe and Shiprock, follows the story of the Chuska Warriors, a New Mexico high school basketball team that is rich in Native American heritage. The team must unite despite personal struggles and challenges to keep the dream of winning the state championship alive.

Win or lose: 'Rez Ball' weaves the trials, triumphs of Native American culture together

The story written and directed by Gallup native, Sydney Freeland (Navajo/Diné) and co-written by Sterlin Harjo of Oklahoma (Seminole Nation), was inspired by the book, “Canyon Dreams: A Basketball Season on the Navajo Nation” and the New York Times article by Michael Powell. “Rez Ball” is now streaming globally on Netflix.

“It’s interesting because I wasn’t looking to do a movie about basketball, about rez ball,” Freeland explained. “It kind of fell out of the sky in the best possible way.”

Freeland said she was approached by Wise Entertainment, a production company that had purchased the rights to a series of New York Times articles by sports journalist Michael Powell, who had embedded himself on the Navajo Nation and documented the rabid following of basketball there. Freeland, who played rez ball/basketball in high school, said she and Harjo decided to co-write the story line for “Rez Ball.”

“I think that the big difference between the two are the articles are sort of outside in perspective,” Freeland said. “And we wanted to tell a story that was from the inside out. We really kind of built this story from the ground up, based on our sort of mutual experiences, myself in New Mexico, Sterlin in Oklahoma, and that was kind of the jumping off point for the film.”

Freeland said one of the great things about making a sports movie and working in the sports genre is there are certain tropes.

“Instead of trying to reinvent those tropes, what we really wanted to do was sort of lean into them,” she explained. “But, for a lot of people, (they are) sort of unfamiliar (with) sort of the backdrop of the reservation. So for us, it was like, ‘OK, it’s not what we’re going to tell, it’s how we’re going to tell it.’ Sports stories are universal, and you get to sort of introduce audiences to a community. A background of culture they might not be as familiar with.”

“Rez Ball” tackles some issues such as alcoholism and mental health that affect many communities including Native American families with a delicate and relatable approach.

“It was just trying to be as honest with our approach to the story as possible,” Freeland explained. “When you’re telling a story about life back on the reservation, you don’t want to sugarcoat stuff, but you also want to shy away from stuff. It really was finding a balance between those things and it was largely, the two of us sort of drawing on our experiences that we had gone through, that our respective communities have gone through. And then, I think when we started shooting, a lot of our actors had very close relationships to the events that are portrayed in the film as well, too.”

She added, addressing sensitive issues in the film was not done for the sake of doing it but rather with the hope that it would be helpful to someone watching the film who may be going through the same personal obstacles.

“Rez Ball” received some star power help from NBA star, LeBron James.

“I think having LeBron James as an executive producer helps grease the wheels a little bit,” Freeland said. “There’s definitely an excitement and anticipation for ‘Rez Ball’ because of just how well known it is in Native communities. And so, when you have someone like LeBron coming on board to tell the story as well, too, you definitely get some excitement in the community.”

Freeland, who is based in Los Angeles, said making the film New Mexico specific and filming in the state was like a homecoming to her in a lot of different ways.

“When we went to scout on the (reservation), we looked at different gymnasiums,” she said. “We looked around Albuquerque, and honestly, the biggest gymnasiums are on the reservation. The Shiprock gym holds 4,000 people. Logistically, we weren’t able to shoot in the gym, so we used the (Santa Fe) Indian School. So the exterior stuff is Shiprock, but the interior, the gym, is actually Santa Fe Indian School.”

Popular New Mexico burger chain, Blake’s Lotaburger, is also featured in the film as well as The Pit at the University of New Mexico, where the state championship games take place in the film.

“We always wanted to shoot in The Pit, and there’s some logistical hurdles to overcome, but The Pit (facilitators) were so receptive and so excited to be able to work together,” Freeland said. “That was kind of a dream come true for myself. Being from New Mexico, The Pit has all this history, and to be able to portray that on film for an audience as big as Netflix’s reach, that’s really exciting.”