The words of the film critic at indieWIRE ("surely deserves a place in the history of American independents alongside John Cassavetes's Shadows") were in my mind while in the middle of watching The Exiles, newly released on DVD. The documentary is up there with the best of the best indie films made in that period (post–World War II, pre–civil rights). The Exiles, however, is an even better and more coherent film than Cassavetes's first feature. Shadows imagined a racial utopia that was on the verge of being fully realized in the heart of urban America. The film hops from place to place; people enter and exit, talk and laugh, walk and dance. The jazz beat never stops. With The Exiles, there is no future or anything on verge of full and flamboyant expression. For the four Native American youth in the Bunker Hill area of L.A., tomorrow barely exists and the past is fast evaporating—indeed, one scene turns the past into a thin dream (a tree, a father playing a drum, a mother resting on a blanket, a ranch hand on a horse). Because there is nothing ahead of or behind the characters, what you see on the screen is something like the absolute present—a moment in time, a slice of the city as it was there and then. And because we are thrown into the present, we notice the depth and details of the images. The film is not about time, but about space or spaces—the first shot is of a large market (it's busy and packed with all sorts of fresh foods); another gives us the details of a boulevard at night; another, the depths of a bar. The Exiles is a sad film but it has a magical ending on a hill surrounded by city lights. www.exilesfilm.com