Shigeki, one of the Ainu people of northern Japan, follows the traditions of his ancestors and teaches his son Motoki about their heritage. But how can old customs be revived after centuries of suppression?
This documentary short is an introduction to the Bella Bella (Heiltsuk) of Campbell Island, 500 km North of Vancouver on the Pacific Coast. Since the coming of settlers, these fishing people have watched their ancient Heiltsuk culture and their independence all but disappear. Today, in an energetic attempt to become self-sufficient, they are regaining both - successfully combining economic development with cultural revival.
An Aboriginal Australian and Native American documentary narrated by award-winning actor Jack Thompson, One Heart-One Spirit tells the story of Kenneth Little Hawk, an elder Micmac/Mohawk performing artist, meeting the oldest surviving culture on the planet: the 40,000 year old Yolngu nation located in northern Australia.
A young student heads back to his village during the COVID-19 lockdown to collect ethnographic material for his thesis, but as quarantine stretches on, the rituals and everyday scenes he records start bringing back childhood memories-leading him to piece the footage together into something more personal.
Ningwasum follows two time travellers Miksam and Mingsoma, played by Subin Limbu and Shanta Nepali respectively, in the Himalayas weaving indigenous folk stories, culture, climate change and science fiction.
Explorer Bruce Parry visits nomadic tribes in Borneo and the Amazon in hope to better understand humanity's changing relationship with the world around us.
Lonnie Kauk’s personal journey to honor his indigenous Yosemite roots, and to connect with his legendary father by repeating his iconic climbs.
A group of filmmakers travel to a Kolla community in Salta to film their folkways. We see all aspects of their life: farming, herding, cooking, football, and making music during a Pachamama festival. In the course of filming, the leader of the Kolla community changes the filmmakers' view of what the documentary should be, and at the end of their visit they are changed. "La vida se puede ir amasando, como el barro": As life goes along, it becomes more pliant, like clay. An announcement at the beginning of the film states that this is neither fiction nor documentary, but I'd say it's closer to documentary.
Muffins for Granny is a remarkably layered, emotionally complex story of personal and cultural survival. McLaren tells the story of her own grandmother by combining precious home movie fragments with the stories of seven elders dramatically affected by their experiences in residential school. McLaren uses animation with a painterly visual approach to move the audience between the darkness of memory and the reality that these charismatic survivors live in today.
Legendary documentary filmmaker Alanis Obomsawin provides a glimpse of what action-driven decolonization looks like in Norway House, one of Manitoba's largest First Nation communities.
The historic gathering of three hundred indigenous activists from North, South and Central America who met in Quito, Ecuador, in July 1990 to organize a cross-continental indigenous resistance to the Columbus Quincentennial.
Documentary about filmmaker Bonnie Ammaaq's memories of life on Baffin Island, where her family moved for eleven years during her childhood from the hamlet of Igloolik to return to the traditional Inuit way of life.
Two young brothers from the Lil'wat Nation set out to ski the sacred mountain they were raised beneath, pushing both themselves and their culture to evolve. To most skiers in British Columbia, Ts’zil (Mount Currie) is a true gem. The gorgeous mountain looms high above Pemberton and is home to many stories of skiers and snowboarders pushing themselves on the classic lines of its Northwest Face. But while Ts’zil is the backdrop to life in the valley, it’s easy to forget that the history of Ts’zil goes much deeper than what's been skied or snowboarded.
In 1986, for the first time in 75 years, the "Chironnup Kamuy Iomante (the sending off of the spirit of the fox)" was held at Bihoro Pass, in Hokkaido. According to the Ainu's traditional beliefs, animals are "gods" called "Kamuy" who live in the "land of gods" ("Kamuimosiri"), but sometimes they come to the "land of humans" ("Ainumosiri"), to offer their meat and furs as gifts. The Ainu take care of them, and they eventually hold an "Iomante (spirit sending)". In this ceremony, people offer prayers, sing songs, and dance, and send the animal back to the "land of the gods" with food and souvenirs.
With no Forest left to hunt and no land to cultivate, the Maby-Guarani depend on the sale of their handcraft to survive. Three young Guarani filmmakers accompany the daily life of two comunities united by the same history, since the first contact with the Europeans until the intense coexistence with today’s White people.
A 13-year-old Indian boy is found unconscious after being attacked in the jungle by the evil spirit Fayu Ujmu. A shaman attempts to ritually tame the spirit and advises the boy’s father to capture it. This story is based on a Chachi Indian legend; it was shot with indigenous inhabitants of the jungle community of Loma Linda, on the Rio Cayapas.
Until the 1950s, the Waorani were able to successfully defended their area of settlement – today’s Yasuni National Park in the Ecuadorian Amazon – with the aid of spears. Then Christian missionaries entered the thick rain forest and paved the way for an oil company. Nowadays many of the tribes are estranged as some want to benefit from the short-term money the company is offering while others fight to preserve their land, culture and independence under all circumstances.
Five Bolivian indigenous women share one goal: climbing the highest mountain in America.