Documentary about "The Coolbaroo Club", which was the only Aboriginal-run dance club in a city which practiced unofficial apartheid. During its lifetime, the Club attracted Black musicians and celebrities from all over Australia and occasionally from overseas. Although best-remembered for the hugely popular Coolbaroo dances attended by hundreds of Aborigines and their white supporters, the "Coolbaroo League", founded by Club members, ran a newspaper and became an effective political organization, speaking out on issues of the day affecting Aboriginal people.
Paralelo 10 (2012)
It portrays a pioneering and risky work carried out in a small Xinane base, by FUNAI, near Parallel 10º South, west of Acre, on the border with Peru. In simple installations, in the middle of the jungle, the sertanista José Carlos Meirelles carries out the difficult mission of protecting the isolated Indians of the region, with the help of anthropologist Terri Aquino. With few resources, specialists perform their tasks tirelessly. In addition to carrying out a permanent negotiation with the riverside populations in the area, they also deal with the confrontation with traffickers and squatters who try to invade it.
Smashing Pumpkins: If All Goes Wrong (2008)
A feature-length documentary about The Smashing Pumpkins, which chronicles the band's residencies at The Orange Peel in Asheville and The Fillmore in San Francisco in summer 2007. The documentary covers Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan's attempts to write and debut new music at the residencies, as well as the revival of the band with new members.
Xapiri (2016)
Xapiri is a Yanomami term that characterizes the shamans, male spirits (xapiri thëpë) and also auxiliary spirits (xapiri pë). Xapiri is an experimental film about Yanomami shamanism that was filmed during a meeting of 37 shamans at the Watoriki Reserve, Roraima, in March of 2011. The film was designed to take into account two different notions of image: those of the Yanomami and ours. Therefore, it does not set out to explain shamanism, its methods or procedures, but to allow different cultures to visualize and feel the way in which the shamans “embody” the spirits, their bodies and voices.
Spirit of the Reindeer (2019)
The third and final part of a trilogy based on Arctic creation myths. The film is a multifaceted tissue weave of myths and traditions reflected in the symbiosis between reindeer, human and landscape.
Before They Fall (2021)
Conservation groups, First Nations, and scientists come together in this timely short film, as a decades-long battle to protect endangered old-growth forests in BC escalates at Fairy Creek (the last unprotected, intact valley on southern Vancouver Island). The film explores the characters’ individual relationships with ancient forests, and why it’s imperative we collectively protect them. It touches on potential solutions, like a transition away from old-growth in the future of logging, and Indigenous sovereignty.
Fairy Creek Blockade - As I See It (NaN)
Mainland reporter hears about protest on Vancouver Island and decides to visit and see it for himself. He spends time to meet people there from both sides, revealing what it is really all about.
Amarok's Song - The Journey to Nunavut (1998)
In this feature-length documentary, three generations of the Caribou Inuit family come together to tell the story of their journey as Canada's last nomads. From the independent life of hunting on the Keewatin tundra to taking the reins of the new territory of Nunavut on April 1, 1999, we see it all. The film is the result of a close collaboration between Ole Gjerstad, a southern Canadian, and Martin Kreelak, an Inuk. It's Martin's family that we follow, as the story is told through his own voice, through those of the Elders, and through those of the teens and young adults who were born in the settlements and form the first generation of those growing up with satellite TV and a permanent home.
Last Stop Larrimah: Murder Down Under (2023)
Nestled deep in the Australian Outback is the town of Larrimah and its 11 eccentric residents. When one of them mysteriously disappears into thin air, the remaining residents become suspects and a long history of infighting is unveiled.
Caribou in the Archive (2018)
In Caribou in the Archive, rustic VHS home video of a Cree woman hunting caribou in the 1990s is combined with NFB archival film footage of northern Manitoba from the 1950s. In this experimental film, the difference between homemade video and official historical record is considered. Northern Indigenous women hunting is at the heart of this personal found footage film in which the filmmaker describes the enigmatic events that led to saving an important piece of family history from being lost forever.
No Address (1988)
This feature-length documentary by Alanis Obomsawin examines the plight of Native people who come to Montreal searching for jobs and a better life. Often arriving without money, friends or jobs, a number of them quickly become part of the homeless population. Both dislocated from their traditional values and alienated from the rest of the population, they are torn between staying and returning home.
Return: Native American Women Reclaim Foodways for Health & Spirit (2019)
Concerned about the declining health of people all around them, Native American women are sparking physical and spiritual rejuvenation through reclaiming traditional foodways.
STANDSinWATER (2022)
Standsinwater Sutherland is 2Spirit Cree living in Northern Ontario. Holding her eagle feather, she sits and tells her story: her quest to identity, how teachings learned along the way took her from the concrete jungle of Toronto back to her reservation and her commitment to help her community regain their culture and traditional ways.
Daughter of a Lost Bird (2021)
What does blood have to do with identity? Kendra Mylnechuk, an adult Native adoptee, born in 1980 at the cusp of the enactment of the Indian Child Welfare Act, is on a journey to reconnect with her birth family and discover her Lummi heritage.
Fast Horse (2018)
The Blackfoot bareback horse-racing tradition returns in the astonishingly dangerous Indian Relay. Siksika horseman Allison Red Crow struggles with secondhand horses and a new jockey on his way to challenging the best riders in the Blackfoot Confederacy.
When the Mountains Tremble (1983)
A documentary on the war between the Guatemalan military and the Mayan population, with first hand accounts by Nobel Peace Prize winner Rigoberta Menchú.
Jewel’s Hunt (2019)
Sixteen-year-old Jewel Wilson is the next generation in a long line of prolific Inupiat subsistence hunters in Unalakleet, Alaska. Her ability to hunt moose is hindered by two pressing issues – scarce wildlife and the pressures of high school life. Finding sufficient food competes with track practice and homework in Jewel’s multilayered world. Along with her father, Jewel turns to the land to feed their family and finds that their village’s way of life is endangered by the same environmental shifts that could affect us all. In hunting moose, we see that Jewel is also hunting for answers. How will her village survive if subsistence hunting is threatened? Can she honor the traditions of her Elders while navigating the pressures and anxieties of a modern, connected teenager? "Jewel’s Hunt" proves to be both physical and philosophical in this insightful exploration of what it means to come of age in complicated times in Unalakleet, Alaska.
The Ninth Island (NaN)
"The Ninth Island" tells the story of Hawaii’s indigenous population and its struggles to stay connected to its ancestral home.
Double M Country (2023)
Carrie Davis was part of the child removal system near the end of the Sixties Scoop. With guidance from her uncle Emmett Sack and the community, Carrie reconnects to their land, language, and culture.
Servant or Slave (2016)
During the time of the Stolen Generations, thousands upon thousands of Aboriginal girls were taken from their families and pressed into domestic servitude by the Australian Government. They were supposedly employed as servants, but with total control over their movements, wages and living conditions, their lives all too frequently became an inescapable cycle of abuse, rape and enslavement, with consequences that echo powerfully to this day. Recounting the stories of five of these women – Rita, Violet and the three Wenberg sisters – Servant or Slave is a commanding piece of first-person testimony to a dark and unacknowledged corner of Australian history. Shot with admirable craft and humanity by documentarian Steven McGregor (Croker Island Exodus, MIFF 2012), Servant or Slave is a work of great sadness and urgency, bringing to forceful life the human tragedy of Australia's Indigenous history in the unadorned words of those who lived it.
Fairy Creek: The Last Stand (2021)
In less than 150 years, 97.3% of British Columbia's old growth forests have been logged. These ancient trees and their ecosystems have been lost forever. Fairy Creek (Ada'itsx), one of BC's last untouched old growth watersheds, lies on Southern Vancouver Island on the unceded territories of the Pacheedaht, Ditidaht and the Huu-ay-aht Nations. Despite Premier John Horgan's 2020 election promise to protect the remaining 2.7% of old growth forest, logging of Fairy Creek continues unabated. In August 2020, forest and land defenders began setting up blockades to prevent the destruction of this beautiful and fragile ecosystem. One year later, after mass civil action, over 500 arrests and intense public pressure, the conflict continues. This comprehensive and compelling documentary film sheds light on the issues around the logging and blockades, through conversations with Indigenous Elders, politicians, police, lawyers, front line activists, and many others.