Tara Houska: Another racist portrayal of Native people on film

On September 25, 2015, Blumhouse Productions will release a film titled “The Green Inferno,” directed by Eli Roth. The film depicts a group of student activists who travel from New York City to the Amazon forest to “save” a tribe. Their plane crashes, and the tribe takes the group hostage and engages in cannibalism, killing them one by one.

Yes, you read that right – in 2015, the silver screen will present the story of American saviors who go to the rainforest to save an uncivilized tribe, but the tribe shows how savage it truly is and turns on their saviors.

Racist portrayals of indigenous people are sadly all too common – whether it’s a sports mascot perpetuating the noble savage stereotype or a grunting buckskin-clad brave brought to life by Hollywood, America refuses to let go of the ideology that Native Americans are a people of the past.

“The Green Inferno” takes it up a notch. Why just feature tribal savages of long ago when you can set the story in modern times and show the tribe actually eating people?

Indignation about the incredibly offensive depiction of indigenous people aside, this couldn’t have come at a worse time for real-life Amazonian tribes.