OUR PEOPLE WILL BE HEALED MAST D: Alanis Obomsawin. Canada. 97 min. Sep 9, 4:45 pm, AGO Sep 11, 12:45 pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 3 Sep 15, 6:15 pm, Scotiabank 14. Rating: NNNN
Obomsawin’s 50th project in as many years explores the restoration of Indigenous culture by plunking us down at the Helen Betty Osborne Ininiw Education Resource Centre in northern Manitoba, where Cree students from nursery to Grade 12 are taught their own history.
As last year’s We Can’t Make The Same Mistake Twice did, this film functions as both cinema and journalism, the camera pushing us into a world we might not otherwise see and illuminating that world on a human scale.
There’s work being done at this place that could save a generation and teach that generation to save the next one, and we’re fortunate to have Obomsawin there to record it for us.
