Skip to main content
Ninan Auassat: We, the Children film image; three people looking at each other while a child plays

Ninan Auassat: We, the Children

Ninan Auassat: Nous, les enfants

Insights

This event has passed

World Premiere

Known for her intimate films, director Kim O’Bomsawin (Call Me Human) invites viewers into the lives of Indigenous youth in this absorbing new documentary. Shot over six years, the film brings us the moving stories, dreams, and experiences of three groups of children and teens from different Indigenous nations: Atikamekw, Eeyou Cree, and Innu. In following these young people through the formative years of their childhood and right through their high school years, we witness their daily lives, their ideas, and aspirations for themselves and their communities, as well as some of the challenges they face.

Notable for the complete absence of adult voices, expert commentary, and narration, the documentary allows these young people to speak confidently, insightfully, and with raw honesty and vulnerability, shaping the film themselves. The result is a captivating journey that becomes a call to action for the many voices, perspectives, and ambitions of this next generation to be heard.

 

Oct 4 & 6: Q&A with director Kim O’Bomsawin

 

Media Partner

Director
Credits
Country of Origin

Canada

Year

2024

Language

In French, English, Innu Aimun and Attikamekw with English subtitles

Film Contact
Content Warning

Coarse language

PG

Open to youth!

93 min
Documentary Indigenous Cinema Q&As at VIFF U18 May Attend Women Directors
National Film Board of Canada

Book Tickets

This event has passed.

Credits & Director

Executive Producer

Colette Loumède, Nathalie Cloutier

Producer

Mélanie Brière, Nathalie Cloutier, Colette Loumède

Screenwriter

Kim O’Bomsawin

Cinematography

Hugo Gendron

Editor

Alexandre Lachance

Original Music

Wyler Wolf

Kim O’Bomsawin headshot; Ninan Auassat: We, the Children director

Kim O’Bomsawin

Kim O’Bomsawin is an award-winning Abenaki documentary filmmaker and sociologist who’s deeply passionate about sharing the stories of Indigenous Peoples. Her work includes Ce silence qui tue (2018), which received the Donald Brittain Award Award for Best Social/Political Documentary at the Canadian Screen Awards, and Je m’appelle humain (2020), winner of Best Canadian Documentary at VIFF. Her series Telling Our Story was featured in TIFF’s Primetime program in 2023. As the president of Terre Innue and Productions Innu Assi, she also gives talks on issues affecting Indigenous Peoples.

Filmography: This Silence That Kills (2018); My Name Is Human (2020)

Photo by Christinne Muschi

Missing VIFF? Check out what's playing at the VIFF Centre

Train Dreams

Dir. Clint Bentley
104 min

A lovely, ruminative movie set in the Pacific Northwest in the first half of the last century. Robert (Joel Edgerton) is a lumberjack, a taciturn man who comes to appreciate the life slipping between his fingers.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre

Wisdom of Happiness

Dir. Philip Delaquis & Barbara Miller
90 min

An audience with the Dalia Lama, who, at 90, looks back on his life and shares the tenets of Buddhism as a practical guide to surviving the 21st Century with joy and compassion.

VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre

Force of Evil

Dir. Abraham Polonsky
79 min

Director-screenwriter Abraham Polonsky uses the mob-controlled "numbers" racket to highlight the soul-destroying elements of capitalism in this punchy noir crime drama. Introduced by Mike Archibald.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema

Köln 75

Dir. Ido Fluk
116 min

The true story behind the greatest solo concert in jazz history, this is Keith Jarrett's legendary 1975 Köln Concert — as organized by 18-year-old rebel music promoter Vera Brandes. Fun, inventive and feminist, it's the Bend It Like Beckham of jazz films.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre

Urchin

Dir. Harris Dickinson
99 min

This impressive, award-winning debut as writer-director from actor Harris Dickinson is a probing portrait of a troubled street kid trying to get his life back on track before it's too late.

VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre

Orwell: 2+2=5

Dir. Raoul Peck
119 min

Oscar-nominated director Raoul Peck reimagines 1984 in this urgent essay on power, language, and control. With narration by Damian Lewis, it’s a chilling portrait of how Orwell’s warnings became our reality.

VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre