KDocsFF 2023 presents two double features about Indigenous governance, history, and resistance

Film's’ directors will take part in discussions at Vancouver’s premier social-justice film festival

SPONSORED POST BY kdocsff

DƏNE YI’INJETL: The Scattering of Man

KDocsFF is pleased to present two double features related to Indigenous governance, history, and resistance as part of its expansive 2023 programming.

Tickets for each double feature include admission to both films, the keynote address for each film, and the joint panel discussion/Q&A.

 

On Thursday, February 23 at  VIFF Centre’s Vancity Theatre, the double feature includes DƏNE YI’INJETL: The Scattering of Man (12:30 pm) and Wochiigii lo: End of the Peace (2:15 pm).

DƏNE YI’INJETL: The Scattering of Man is directed by the film’s keynote speaker, Luke Gleeson. When BC Hydro built the W.A.C. Bennett Dam in 1968, it flooded the Rocky Mountain Trench, a region belonging to the Tsay Keh Dene First Nation since time immemorial. With steady, experimental rhythm, Gleeson tells the story of how his people’s lands were flooded, pairing archival news clips and interview footage with sweeping shots of a land(scape) now completely transformed. The events that followed the dam’s construction are recounted in visual prose and through the traditions of Dene storytelling. 

Wochiigii lo: End of the Peace is directed by Haida filmmaker Heather Hatch, the keynote speaker, who explores the many environmental, social, legal, and human perils of BC’s controversial Site C hydro dam project. The gargantuan hydro-electric project is on northern British Columbia’s Peace River, which cuts across the province in an area largely populated by Indigenous peoples—including West Moberly and Prophet River First Nations, two of the smallest bands covered under Treaty 8, the government’s century-old agreement with Indigenous people intended to last “as long as the sun shines, the grass grows and the rivers flow”. Those words haunt  Hatch, who spent five years documenting the protests and legal challenges to Site C

After Wochiigii lo: End of the Peace, there will be a joint panel discussion and Q&A where themes common to both films will be discussed. Joining Hatch and Gleeson are Chief Johnny Pierre, Chief of Tsay Keh Dene Nation and DƏNE YI’INJET film subject; and Diane Abel of the West Moberly First Nation, Film subject in Wochiigii lo.

 

 

On Friday, February 24, at VIFF Centre’s Vancity Theatre, the double feature includes the films Returning Home (12:30 pm) and The Doctrine of Recovery (2:15 pm).

Skilfully intertwining narratives concerning residential school survivors and Indigenous peoples’ relationship with imperiled wild Pacific salmon, Sean Stiller’s stirring Returning Home is a revelatory testament to strength and resilience. At the heart of the film is Phyllis Jack-Webstad, the survivor who founded the Orange Shirt Day movement, and the film’s keynote speaker. While Phyllis recounts her childhood trials to youth across the country, her relations in the Secwépemc territory near Williams Lake are contending with another outcome of colonialism: the upper Fraser River’s lowest salmon runs in Canadian history. The first production by Canadian Geographic Films, Returning Home balances Stiller’s stunning cinematography with clear-eyed testimonies to the unforgivable transgressions endured by Jack-Webstad and other survivors within the walls of residential schools.

Brišind is the director of The Doctrine of Recovery and the film’s keynote speaker. The documentary looks at the effects of the Papal Bull of 1493, Pope Alexander VI’s apocalyptic declaration, which established a free-for-all in the European conquest of Tribal lands and souls. It was their “Doctrine of Discovery.” To the First People of this land, it was a death song they had never heard, but soon enough, they would all sing. It is timely that three highly respected Indigenous women from Turtle Island, including one of Canada’s most celebrated actors, Crystle Lightning, have come together to create a documentary about the devastating impacts of the Doctrine of Discovery.

A joint panel discussion and Q&A follows The Doctrine of Recovery with Phyllis Jack-Webstad, member of the Stswecem’c Xgat’tem First Nation; Patricia M. Barkaskas, academic director of Indigenous Community Legal Clinic and Academic Director of ILS at UBC; Georgina Lightning, producer of The Doctrine of Recovery; and Judy Wilson, Secretary-Treasurer of Union of BC Indian Chiefs, Chief, member of Neskonlith Indian Band, and film subject. The discussion will be moderated by Á’a:líya Warbus, Indigenous Artist-in-Residence at KPU.

For tickets and more information on these films and others, see KDocsFF.

Post sponsored by KDocsFF.