As a special screening of two episodes of the TV show Dark Winds was about to roll at a local cinema over the weekend, it was clear there was a lot of hometown pride in the room.
A sold-out crowd was buzzing with anticipation, knowing that they would be seeing some of the new season of the locally produced show on the big screen.
Even New Mexico congresswoman Teresa Leger Fernandez was in attendance.
Dark Winds focuses mainly on three Navajo police officers in the 1970s American Southwest—the cases they investigate and the struggles they encounter as indigenous people.
It’s filmed in and around Santa Fe and a number of other New Mexico locations, including Tesuque Pueblo, Camel Rock Studios, Espanola, Abiquiú, and Cochiti Pueblo.
Three actors were there for a post-screening Q&A, including Deanna Allison, a Diné performer who plays a key role in the series as Emma Leaphorn, a nurse and the wife of the show’s main character, tribal police lieutenant Joe Leaphorn.
In response to one question, Allison talked about playing a character who who provides a foundational role as a mother and care provider.
“ So through my Emma, I hope that she can show how you can survive grief, loss, pain as Diné women do often," Allison said.
"But as matriarchs, that is part of our resiliency. And I love that Emma will show you how to heal. So that's where that will never, ever be lost. And that is something that we learned from our past, from our parents, from that matrilineal system, from that family structural system of Navajo, from our past, present, and future.”
The two other actors at the Dark Winds screening on Saturday were Kiowa Gordon, who plays Jim Chee, and Natalie Benally, who plays Natalie Bluehouse on the show.
The screening was sponsored by the Santa Fe International Film Festival.
