Indigenous Filmmaker Recommendations
An overview of Jeff Barnaby and Zacharias Kunuk, two contemporary Indigenous filmmakers who have helped give Indigenous cinema greater attention.
Many Indigenous forms of artwork are receiving a greater amount of attention today. The contributions to Canadian culture made by Indigenous people is getting more recognition and recognized as part of Canadian artwork. One example of these is cinema in which several Indigenous films focus on themes of colonization and particularly how it impacts individual communities within Canada’s political landscape. The course CIN205H5 Canadian Auteurs discusses contemporary filmmakers in Canada in a comparative study. Several key Auteurs looked at in the course are Indigenous and their contributions to Canadian cinema.
One Indigenous filmmaker is Jeff Barnaby the director of the films Blood Quantum (2019) and Rhymes For Young Ghouls (2013). Barnaby was a Mi’kmaq an Indigenous group of people who are native to areas in Canada’s Atlantic provinces. He started his career by directing short films and his debut short titled From Cherry English (2004) an allegory for the threats posed on Indigenous identity told through the hallucinogenic journey the protagonist embarks on. The short earned two Golden Sheaf Awards for “Best Aboriginal” and “Best Videography” in that year’s Yorkton Film Festival.
Later he directed another short film titled File Under Miscellaneous (2010) a dystopian science fiction film about a Mi’kmaq man who undergoes intense surgery to become white as a response to being victimized by anti-First Nations racism. The film received a Genie Award for “Best Live Action Short Drama.” The full extent of Barnaby’s authorial style can be seen in his debut film Rhymes For Young Ghouls (2013). The premise of this film is that a teenager named Aila is plotting revenge against the Canadian residential school system. The film is based on the documented history of abuse First nations people experienced in this system. For his work on the film the Vancouver Film Critics Circle named Barnaby “Best Director of a Canadian Film.”
Then, in 2019, he directed a horror film titled Blood Quantum (2019) which takes place on the Red Crow Indian Reservation in Quebec and is about an infection turning people into zombies. The film uses the horror genre to depict new ideas on colonialism and de civilization. The film features a role reversal between Indigenous people and Europeans as the Indigenous people are immune to the plague while the white refugees on the land aren’t. Through this storytelling Barnaby is depicting the broader societal norms and audience expectations since the Indigenous’s people immunity reinforces their connection to the land. Sadly Barnaby died on October 13, 2022 after battling cancer, however his influence on Indigenous filmmaking remains intact to this day.
Another Indigenous filmmaker who discusses similar things to Barnaby is Zacharias Kunuk. Kunuk was born in 1957 in Nunavut (then part of the Northwest Territories) and attended school in Igloolik in 1966. He began practicing filmmaking from a young age as he purchased cameras and photographed Inuit hunting scenes before purchasing his own video camera to make movies. He started off his career with Nunavut Our Land (1995) a docudrama series covering the formation of the territory of Nunavut. He then served as a co-writer and co-director for the film The Journals of Knud Rasmussen (2006) about Inuit spiritual beliefs documented by the Danish explorer Knud Rasmussen across the Canadian arctic. The film was a nominee for the “Rogers Best Canadian Film Award” at the Toronto Film Critics Association Awards 2006.
Another film by Kunuk is One Day in the Life of Noah Piugattuk (2019) about a real life Inuk hunter by the same name who was encouraged to give up their Inuk lifestyle and assimilate into a modern settlement by a Canadian government agent. The film has a unique approach to cinema as it is mostly scenes of Noah sitting in silence, in many of these he consumes large amounts of sugar to emphasize the psychological impact of colonization. This unique cinematic style causes the viewing experience to stick with the viewer and helps them process the impact of the struggles Noah and other Indigenous people faced. The film received the award for “Best Canadian Film” at the Vancouver International Film Festival.
Overall both Jeff Barnaby and Zachiaras Kunuk are prime examples of contemporary Indigenous filmmakers who have impacted cinema.
