Women Make Waves International Film Festival

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    Kanehsatake: 270 Years of Resistance

    Alanis OBOMSAWIN 1993 Canada color 119min English DCP
    In July 1990, a dispute over a proposed golf course to be built on Kanien’kéhaka (Mohawk) lands in Quebec, set the stage for a confrontation that would grab international headlines and sear itself into the Canadian consciousness. OBOMSAWIN spent 78 days behind Kanien’kéhaka lines filming the armed standoff between protestors, the Quebec police and the Canadian army. Released in 1993, this landmark documentary has made history at the Toronto International Film Festival, where it became the first documentary ever to win the Best Canadian Feature award. This powerful documentary is seen as a “watershed film in the history of First Peoples cinema.”

    Director

    Alanis OBOMSAWIN

    "A member of the Abenaki Nation and one of the most important Indigenous filmmakers of all time, Alanis OBOMSAWIN was born in 1932 and grew up in the Odanak reserve, northeast of Montreal. She has made over 50 films during her almost-five-decade career. Also a singer, an artist, and an educator, she devotes her life to Indigenous activist movements, defending the rights of the First Nations people. In the 1960s, OBOMSAWIN was touring around North America, sharing Indigenous stories in the language of Abenaki as a singer. Since 1967, she has been working as a consultant of Indigenous cinema at the National Film Board of Canada. In 1971, her short Christmas at Moose Factory marks the directorial debut of this legendary Abenaki director. OBOMSAWIN’s films empower the characters and the subjects by letting them tell the stories in their own language. Her focus on the rights of Indigenous people, cultural heritage, and environmental consciousness makes her a passionate and productive filmmaker. Her works cover themes including cultural practices and oral histories of Indigenous people, human and non-human relationships, traditional territories, and unjust capitalist and colonialist constructs. She is often at the front line of social movements, recording the story of her people.

    Alanis OBOMSAWIN

    1971 Christmas at Moose Factory
    1977 Mother of Many Children
    1977 Amisk
    1984 Incident at Restigouche
    1986 Richard Cardinal: Cry from a Diary of a Métis Child
    1988 No Address
    1993 Kanehsatake: 270 Years of Resistance
    1995 My Name Is Kahentiiosta
    2000 Rocks at Whiskey Trench
    2002 Is the Crown At War With Us?
    2003 Our Nationhood
    2005 Sigwan
    2006 Waban-Aki: People from Where the Sun Rises
    2014 Trick or Treaty?
    2016 We Can't Make the Same Mistake Twice
    2019 Jordan River Anderson, the Messenger

    Director, Screenwriter, Narrator, Reseacher: Alanis OBOMSAWIN
    Producer: Wolf KOENIG, Alanis OBOMSAWIN
    Executive Producer: Colin NEALE
    Cinematographer: Roger ROCHAT, Jean-Claude LABRECQUE, Philippe AMIGUET, Susan TROW, François BRAULT, Barry PERLES, Zoe DIRSE, Jocelyn SIMARD, André-Luc DUPONT, Savas KALOGERAS
    Editor: Yurij LUHOVY
    Sound Editor: Tony REED, Don AYER
    Re-Recording Mixer: Jean-Pierre JOUTEL
    Animation Cinematographer: Pierre LANDRY, Lynda PELLEY
    Music Composer: Claude VENDETTE, Francis GRANDMONT
    Musician: Claude VENDETTE, Francis GRANDMONT, Pierre Gauthier
    Additional Photographer: Sylvain JULIENNE, Jean-Pierre RANCOURT, Marcel POULIN
    Still Photographer: Robert GALBRAITH, John KENNEY, Ryan REMIORZ
    Location Sound: Raymond MARCOUX, Robert VEREBELY, Ismaël CORDEIRO, Marie-France DELAGRAVE,
    Catherine VAN DER DONCKT, Serge FORTIN, Juan GUTIÉRREZ
    Music Editor: Chris CRILLY
    Voice: Jack BURNING, Herbie BARNES
    Graphic Artist: Kate DE VOLPI

    Eric SEGUIN
    National Film Board of Canada
    E.Seguin@nfb.ca

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