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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

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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

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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

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