Billy Oxendine & Locklear Hunt Shine in Gritty Family Drama
By Leah Smith
Dr. Malinda Maynor Lowery has worn many hats during her career. She is an award winning author of multiple books, an Emmy nominated documentary filmmaker, and has been a professor at many highly respected universities, including Emory University, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and Harvard University. This year, she entered the arena of narrative filmmaking with resounding success with “Lumbeeland” an ode to Lumbee culture and heritage all while tackling an extremely hard subject: the drug trade.
Directed by Montana Cypress, the film follows Dollar (Billy Oxendine), an aspiring drug dealer looking to make his own way from under the umbrella of his kingpin grandfather Dock (Harvey Godwin). We watch Dollar as he attempts to balance this out with his commitment as a single father to his daughter Danielle (Bethany Harris) and as a devoted son to his mother Connie (Antoinette Locklear Hunt). The film showcases the harsh reality of the drug trade, which has plagued the Lumbee community after years of colonialist oppression.
Despite its 30-minute runtime, “Lumbeeland” tells a complex story with many interesting characters that leaves you wanting more. Every aspect of this film exudes authenticity from the moment it begins to the moment it ends, which was the goal of Lowery when she teamed up with Cypress and Honey Head Productions to create an authentically Lumbee story, made by Lumbee people in a Lumbee community.
A big part of the authenticity comes from its performances from the cast, led by UNCP theater graduate and star of the upcoming outdoor drama Strike at the Wind Billy Oxendine. Oxendine’s range as an actor is on full display as he balances Dollar’s braggadocious nature as a drug dealer with his more sensitive side as a family man. On paper, this role could have been played by anyone, but Oxendine takes it and makes it his own, commanding the screen every time he is on it. Everything down to his facial expressions truly encapsulates the character, to the point that if I saw someone else play the role, it would not feel nearly the same.
This is all the more impressive when you learn that this is Oxendine’s first foray into film. He is a veteran of the stage, having graduated from the UNCP theater program and having attended the Pace University Actors Studio Drama School for the past three years. He described the process of getting into character as “much more intimate” compared to his time in theater, and credited his education with helping him learn the skills he used to succeed in the role.
“[It’s] something I’ve fortunately been training on in school. We do much more of a method [style of] acting… it’s all being present in the moment and allowing yourself to be fully available, so I’d say that training really helped,” Oxendine said. “With theater, I feel like it’s all about going big, and being able to go bigger, that’s much harder to do than actually bringing it down. So having that skill and being able to enhance my performance helped with being able to tone it down in a more intimate setting.”
Oxendine was not the only member of the cast to give an exceptional performance either, as each actor embraced their roles in order to give each character depth. One in particular was Antoinette Locklear Hunt as Connie. She commands each scene that she is in with a powerful performance filled with emotion, drawing from personal experiences to create a beautiful portrayal of a mother who wants the best for her son and granddaughter while also wrestling with her own problems. Connie’s character is also involved in the drug trade that Dollar and Dock are a part of, and Hunt was able to tap into her experience as a detective to understand the ins and outs of her role.
This is another truly impressive performance, as Hunt indicated during a Q&A at the Lumbee Film Festival that not only was this her first time being in a film, but also her first time acting. Make no mistake, though: if she wanted to continue acting, she absolutely could.
Former Lumbee Tribe Chairman Harvey Godwin plays a complex role in Dock extremely well. You can sense throughout the film how he wrestles with his responsibilities as kingpin of the drug trade and member of the community and family man from both his mannerisms and his interactions. Godwin and Oxendine have great chemistry; Dock and Dollar’s interactions are representative of how different generations often view the same circumstances differently, and often clash over the right way to go about solving issues. They demonstrate this gap perfectly, with Oxendine’s passionate portrayal of Dollar perfectly complimenting the cunning nature of Godwin’s Dock.
Roger Dale Locklear is also featured very heavily, playing the villainous Gage wonderfully. He plays into Gage’s sly, manipulative nature extremely well, and his deep voice is perfect for such an intense role. His character is extremely well written, and Locklear’s portrayal truly creates the perfect antagonist alongside Dock, but seemingly without the moral quandaries Dock goes through.
It would be remiss not to discuss the filmmaking techniques throughout the entirety of the film as well. Cypress left no stone unturned when it came to displaying this story perfectly with his direction. Each shot was meticulously selected in order to elicit the proper emotions we are supposed to feel as an audience, both about the story and the characters themselves. He uses a lot of closeup shots during exchanges of dialogue, allowing us to take in the full range of emotion each actor brings to the table. His framing of shots is spectacular as well, utilizing symmetry perfectly and embracing the philosophy of “pure cinema,” or telling a story that can be told without the use of dialogue.
One scene in particular stands out that shows this perfectly: Dollar and his daughter Danielle visit Dock’s house before his birthday party, eating cake together. Dollar stands on one side of the kitchen island, hunched over his plate, across from Dock, who stands tall next to a window. In between them is Danielle, who stands on another side of the island facing the camera. This shot nonverbally establishes the current state of the relationship between our two conflicting parties Dollar and Dock, as Dock stands at the top of the food chain as the kingpin while Dollar sits below him as someone who moves product. Danielle, the only truly innocent party in this interaction, stands between them as an unwilling victim of both of their actions. After a sequence of dialogue and a closeup of Dock watching someone forcibly brought into a barn outside, he leaves through a door in the room behind Danielle. When the camera transitions back to a wide shot of the room, the two have swapped sides, remaining visually separated. The entire scene is indicative that these two figures view each other as opposition, and is foreshadowing of the conflict they have with each other later in the film.
This is just one scene in between a multitude of shots in the film that tell their own story, and this film is better because of it. Cypress took special care to make sure that Lowery’s story was shown with the utmost respect and authenticity that it deserved.
Speaking of Lowery, if you did not know that this was her first attempt at narrative filmmaking, you wouldn’t be able to tell. Despite a short runtime, the story is very well paced. Each event makes sense chronologically, and the intermittent flashbacks provide the perfect amount of context during the film’s major scenes. The dialogue, based on real conversations she and other Lumbee community members have heard in the past, flows very well and does not overwhelm the scenes with unnecessary exposition. Everything from the opening, to the introduction of the major players during an elaborate funeral sequence, all the way to the tragic finale, is carefully crafted. Lowery clearly has a talent for writing, and it’s not just as an author of award winning books.
The short film, unfortunately, is not planned for release in its current state at this time. At the premiere, Lowery and fellow executive producer Efrain Colon indicated their plan to potentially turn the proof-of-concept into a full length feature film or series, as there are so many stories that can be told surrounding these characters and the life they live. It will depend on whether or not this venture stays independent or is picked up by a major studio- a determination which has not been made yet. Lowery and Colon both have full schedules upcoming, with Colon participating in table reads for various upcoming projects and Lowery working on another book in collaboration with historian Christina Snyder as well as a research project.
I do hope that there will come a time where this film does get a proper release, whether it be in its current state or as a full length feature or series in the future. This is a story that deserves to be told. Many families have experienced trauma with regards to drug culture, and an often underrepresented group who knows just how devastating it can be are our native communities, particularly the Lumbee. Stories like this can provide hope that one day we can learn from our past in order to protect those we care about in the future. When this project is ultimately available to a wider audience, I cannot recommend it enough.
If you wish to follow the development of “Lumbeeland,” feel free to follow their profiles on social media. They can be found on Facebook with the name ‘Lumbeeland Film’ and on Instagram with the handle @lumbeeland_film.