STOODIS
Festival Schedule


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Inspired by Cree filmmaker Neil Diamond’s entertaining and insightful look at the portrayal of North American Indigenous people throughout a century of cinema in his 2009 documentary, Reel Injun, the STOODIS Film Festival is at once a retrospective and a showcase of recent work of Indigenous made narrative shorts and features.

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Bones of Crows (126min)

Friday, June 23, 7:00 pm

Bones of Crows

Marie Clements’ Bones of Crows is a powerful indictment of the abuse of Indigenous peoples and a stirring story of extraordinary resilience and resistance. Born in the 1920s into a happy, large family, Aline Spears (played at different ages by Summer Testawich, Grace Dove, and Carla Rae) and her siblings are forcibly removed — through threat and essentially extortion by church and local authorities — from their home and sent to residential schools. There, they are victims of the cruelty of the priests and nuns who run the school. As the film clearly and dramatically points out, this psychological, physical, and cultural abuse was basically official government policy. During World War II, Aline enlists in the military, where, in a great but not widely known historical irony, her contribution is highly valued precisely because she is still fluent in Cree — one of the languages the residential schools strove to eradicate. After the war, Aline returns to Canada to raise her children. Still haunted by the crimes committed against her, she endures years of anguish before she finally has the chance to confront her abusers. The cast boasts talented newcomers and an all-star collection of established Indigenous actors, among them Glen Gould, Michelle Thrush, Gail Maurice (whose directorial debut feature, Rosie, is at TIFF this year), Cara Gee, Joshua Odjick (a TIFF Rising Star this year), Paulina Alexis, and in one of the most welcome cameos this year, legendary filmmaker Alanis Obomsawin.Fearless in its denunciation of centuries of oppressive policies by Canadian governments and institutions, Bones of Crows is also a memorable paean to the resilience and determination of those who survived the residential schools — and especially those, like Aline, who sought to bring their oppressors’ crimes to light. Synopsis by Steve Gravestock

Reel Injun (86min)

Sat. June 24, 2023 5:00 pm

Reel Injun

In this feature-length documentary, Cree filmmaker Neil Diamond takes an entertaining and insightful look at the portrayal of North American Indigenous people throughout a century of cinema. Featuring hundreds of clips from old classics as well as recent releases, the film traces the evolution of the “Hollywood Indian.” Diamond guides the audience on a journey across America to some of cinema’s most iconic landscapes and conducts candid interviews with celebrities like Clint Eastwood, Robbie Robertson and Jim Jarmusch. The film is a loving look at cinema through the eyes of the people who appeared in its very first flickering images and have survived to tell their stories in their own way.

Slash/Back (86min)

Sat. June 24, 2023 7:30pm

Slash/Back

The debut feature from Iqaluit-raised director Nyla Innuksuk, Slash/Back packs a vivid and thrilling punch, as a girl gang in Pangnirtung, Nunavut is left to fight off a supernatural apocalypse. Employing strategies from their favourite horror movies, weapons from their kitchens, and power from their friends, the girls must battle a mysterious alien force to save their home. Slash/Back presents a promising young cast and a vibrant portrait of resilience, friendship, and what it means to fight for community. Join their journey of rebellion, self-discovery, and bad-bitchery! Synopsis by Julia Yoo

1-Day Super-8 Youth Film Challenge +ImagiNative Shorts (100min)

Sun. June 25 1:00 pp

Super-8ImagiNATIVE

This program features six single-day, shot, hand-processed and presented local Indigenous youth made analogue Super-8 films, plus a dynamic selection of six short films by Indigenous filmmakers, all of which were presented at the 2022 imagineNATIVE Film + Media Arts Festival. This short film program reflects on the passing of knowledge from one generation to the next and honouring where you and your ancestors have come from.

Bones of Crows

Sunday, June 25, 4:00pm

Bones of Crows


Marie Clements’ Bones of Crows is a powerful indictment of the abuse of Indigenous peoples and a stirring story of extraordinary resilience and resistance. Born in the 1920s into a happy, large family, Aline Spears (played at different ages by Summer Testawich, Grace Dove, and Carla Rae) and her siblings are forcibly removed — through threat and essentially extortion by church and local authorities — from their home and sent to residential schools. There, they are victims of the cruelty of the priests and nuns who run the school. As the film clearly and dramatically points out, this psychological, physical, and cultural abuse was basically official government policy. During World War II, Aline enlists in the military, where, in a great but not widely known historical irony, her contribution is highly valued precisely because she is still fluent in Cree — one of the languages the residential schools strove to eradicate. After the war, Aline returns to Canada to raise her children. Still haunted by the crimes committed against her, she endures years of anguish before she finally has the chance to confront her abusers. The cast boasts talented newcomers and an all-star collection of established Indigenous actors, among them Glen Gould, Michelle Thrush, Gail Maurice (whose directorial debut feature, Rosie, is at TIFF this year), Cara Gee, Joshua Odjick (a TIFF Rising Star this year), Paulina Alexis, and in one of the most welcome cameos this year, legendary filmmaker Alanis Obomsawin.Fearless in its denunciation of centuries of oppressive policies by Canadian governments and institutions, Bones of Crows is also a memorable paean to the resilience and determination of those who survived the residential schools — and especially those, like Aline, who sought to bring their oppressors’ crimes to light. Synopsis by Steve Gravestock

Stellar

Sunday, June 25, 7:00pm

Stellar

A dreamy love story between She, played by Night Raiders lead Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers, and the up-and-coming actor Braeden Clarke, takes place in the unexpected haven of a Northern Ontario dive bar while natural disasters unfold. The experimental film Stellar is the fourth feature from Anishinaabe director and producer Darlene Naponse, based on her short story of the same name. Veering away from her past work (including Falls Around Her, a TIFF ’18 selection starring Tantoo Cardinal), here Naponse intersperses the flirtation between She and He with a meteorite dropping down outside the bar, creating multiple extreme environmental crises seen only through the giant front window. Inside the bar, She and He are untouched by massive wildfires, flooding, and more happening outside — but their connection to the land isn’t questioned, because every major movement they make cuts to beautiful shots of land and water that are alternately lush and peaceful or extractive and unnatural. Stellar’s characters speak in poetic spurts as they relate different stories about themselves and where they’re from. Eclectic visitors pop into the bar. Some of them are treated as interlopers giving unwanted advice and help. Others, like Cree actor Tina Keeper and Cree actor and writer Billy Merasty, are welcomed as family. Focusing on touch, connection to one another, and the land, with nods to the context in which Indigenous people have endured and flourished, Stellar is a contemporary Indigenous romance unlike any other.Synopsis by Kelly Boutsalis

Wildhood (108min)

Monday, June 26, 5:00 pm

Wildhood

Two-spirit Mi’kmaw teenager Link (Phillip Lewitski) is just discovering—and asserting—his sexuality when his already volatile home life goes off the rails. His abusive father explodes after the cops bust Link and his half-brother Travis (Avery Winters-Anthony) for stealing scrap metal. When he finds out that his supposedly dead mother may be alive, Link flees with Travis in tow. Sparks fly in a chance encounter with teen drifter Pasmay (Joshua Odjick), who shares Link’s Indigenous roots and offers to help find his mother — but will Link’s (well-founded) mistrust of people ruin his potential new relationship and the group’s mission? Riffing on the road-movie genre, director Bretten Hannam charts Link’s growing self-awareness, which is deeply connected to the (re)discovery of his heritage. It’s been a while since a movie has fully relished in the bucolic Eastern Canada countryside. The landscape (Annapolis Valley in traditional Mi’kmaq territory) offers succour to Link and Travis — and opens them up to a very different world. Wildhood will elicit comparisons to recent Canadian titles like Firecrackers and Sleeping Giant, but the protagonists in those films were constrained by their age and limited choices. While Link and Travis aren’t free from danger, heartbreak, or disappointment, their lives are increasingly defined by possibility. Wildhood is an accomplished film driven by Hannam’s direction and writing, fine craft (cinematographer Guy Godfree stands out especially), skilled veterans like Michael Greyeyes (in a brief but pivotal role), and some amazing young performers — and its equation of the road with the possibility of freedom couldn’t have come at a better time. Synopsis by Steve Gravestock

Night Raiders (101min)

Monday, June 26, 7:30 pm

Night Raiders

With several groundbreaking short films behind her, Danis Goulet makes her feature debut with one of the most important Canadian films in recent memory. A searing thriller set in the near future, Night Raiders digs deep into Canada’s painful past to craft a compelling, propulsive piece of genre cinema. After a destructive war across North America, a military occupation seizes control of society. One of their core tactics: taking children from their families and putting them into State Academies, or forced-education camps. Niska (Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers) is a Cree mother desperate to protect her daughter Waseese (Brooklyn Letexier-Hart). But events force mother and daughter to separate, leading Niska to join a group of Cree vigilantes to get her daughter back. If this story echoes the real forced assimilation of Indigenous children that colonising powers undertook in Canada, the US, Australia, and beyond, that’s no coincidence. Goulet is Cree-Métis from northern Saskatchewan. With Night Raiders, she transforms the ugly reality of residential schools into remarkable, cinematic world building. The production design, cinematography, and visual effects all contribute to a full immersion in a powerful, fictional world. But Goulet’s vision, combined with powerful performances from Tailfeathers, Letexier-Hart, and Gail Maurice, bring this speculative future into dialogue with our past. Night Raiders is not just a singular Canadian film, but a new view of Canada for the whole world.

Rosie (92min) + Otepmisiwak (30min)

Tuesday, June 27, 5:00 pm

Rosie

Métis writer-director-actor Gail Maurice’s feature film debut tells the story of a suddenly orphaned Indigenous girl and her newly chosen family in Montreal in the 1980s.Rosie (Keris Hope Hill) is a visibly Indigenous, English-speaking, sweet, and headstrong little girl and her mother has just died. A children’s services agent brings her to her only living relative, her Francophone aunt Frédèrique (Mélanie Bray). “Fred” doesn’t have a solid foundation on which to raise a child. She is unprepared — she’s working at an adult entertainment shop and threatened with eviction — and is at first unwilling to take on caring for her adopted sister’s young daughter.From images of people working on the street to a scene involving sleeping rough in a car in a junkyard, ROSIE captures an uncomfortable reality understood through innocent eyes. Seeing things from the girl’s viewpoint explains why Fred’s gender-bending friends — from the Cree perspective of being genderless — Flo (Constant Bernard) and Mo (Alex Trahan) appear in various forms of drag, and why the night in the car is seen as a fun camping experience. The film focuses on characters living on the fringes of society, including a homeless Cree man (Brandon Oakes), and how united and transformed they become through the eponymous character’s vibrant presence. Touching on the Sixties Scoop and disconnection from Indigenous identity, ROSIE is an ode to finding your chosen family when your blood relations have been removed from the picture. Synopsis by Kelly Boutsalis

REgeneration:
James Pakootas & Nikita Rain
(LIVE)

Tuesday, June 27, 7:30 pm

James PakootasNikita Rain

REgeneration: A healing journey through nature, movement, poetry, and film. James Pakootas teams with Nikita Rain to explore our relationship with trauma, facing our own truths, and our ability to heal.

James Pakootas is a modern-day story weaver from The Colville Confederated Tribes. He is an award-winning vocalist, producer, and filmmaker who cultivates change through the power of words. James comes from people whose future, present and past are expressed through art, song, and movement. As a vocalist who creates conscious hip hop and spoken word poetry, he carries on this tradition. James tells stories - stories that empower, stories that fascinate, and stories that speak truth to our existence.

Introducing
Nikita Rain, who will be performing with James at The Civic. Nikita is Secwepemc and Dakelh and is from the Xat'sull First Nation. She also has Danish, Italian, Irish, French, and Scottish ancestry. Nikita's story of resilience and power stems from intergenerational healing. Her biological grandpa is a survivor of the Kamloops residential school and her father was a "60's scoop" child, who was adopted into a non-indigenous family and disconnected from his culture and language. Nikita has been pow wow dancing for four years. She has been able to connect with her roots, is proud of her culture, and loves to share her dance. (photo credit: Louis Bockner)

Blood Quantum

Tuesday, June 27, 9:00 pm

Blood Quantum

Jeff Barnaby, who passed away at the young age of 46 last year, leaves a legacy and impact on audiences and the industry that will permanently resonate. The Mi’kmaq filmmaker turned expectations of Indigenous and Canadian/Quebec filmmaking upside down and brazenly forged an explosive oeuvre ripe with ferocious action, references, and characters, as well as forthright commentary. With Blood Quantum, Barnaby presents the colonialist concept of Indigenous blood calculation and identity and performs a revenge of the very notion. When a brazen virus takes over the white population and turns them into blood-thirsty zombies, the nearby Mi’kmaq reserve residents of Red Crow find themselves immune and in need of remaining on their own in order to survive. Blood Quantum is thought-through bloody madness and an astonishing vessel of ideas in what turns out to simultaneously be big entertainment. Synopsis by Magali Simard