Event Info
Before the Streets: Director: Chloe Leriche
The cinematography is dreamy. A women yells for help and there is good old India...
7:00pm
$10.50
Event Description
The cinematography is dreamy. A women yells for help and there is good old Indian soup on the stove. Gift giving and necklaces, as the Kokum (grandmother) cares for her children. Full to the edges of the frame with indigenous aesthetics, life ways and ways of being in the world. Shot entirely on reserve with three Atikamekw First Nations communities and non-professional actors, there is something completely real and true about this film. No fancy set, props and costumes, but rather the capturing of the everyday with hints of dogma film techniques, perhaps rez dog/ma. In this place, this village, there are no signs of capitalistic tropes.
The story reveals a young man’s journey to and through a place of ethics. He is distraught, as is his father, but finally they get to exchange…reason! Whose fault? The realities of a father and son finding their place within each other. The seemingly “bad” boy and “piggish” father revealed through a passage of time. The father wants to protect his son. As the son works, the tasks he is going to be forced to perform are extremely unpleasant and the experience reveals who these people are, or could become. The entire family argues, they push and shove, the tension is deep, visible and real. How can this stop? Successful or not – the portrayal is chilling. The difficult present of settler colonial violence and lateral violence indicate that indigenous culture saves indigenous lives. A lesson in life - learn to sing your song/s.