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

Montreal, ma belle

Dir. Xiaodan He
118 min

In this Valentine to discovering love later in life, the ever-elegant Joan Chen plays Feng Xia, a 53-year-old Chinese immigrant and mother in Montreal whose world is turned upside down when she meets and falls in love with a young Quebecoise.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre

Tough Old Broads

Dir. Stacey Tenenbaum
90 min

Tough Old Broads is a feature documentary that follows three trailblazing women as they continue to make waves well into their 70s. Because you can't keep a good woman down.

VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre

The Voice of Hind Rajab

Dir. Kaouther Ben Hania
89 min

Mixing documentary and reenactment, this film powerfully evokes the desperate attempts of the Red Crescent to rescue a six year old child trapped in a car under Israeli military fire. Oscar nominee: Best International Film

VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre

It Was Just an Accident

Dir. Jafar Panahi
105 min

Having offered some late-night assistance to a stranger in the wake of an auto accident, a mechanic grows convinced that he recognizes the supposed stranger’s voice as that of his torturer during a grueling prison spell.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema

One Battle After Another

Dir. Paul Thomas Anderson
162 min

PT Anderson's breathless satire is the best political action movie of 2025, a defiantly anti-MAGA rallying cry featuring a six pack of crackerjack performances. They'll still be talking about this one 50 years from now.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema

Turner & Constable

Dir. David Bickerstaff
93 min

Filmed as a supplement to a blockbuster exhibition at Tate Britain happening right now, this doc in the popular Exhibition on Screen series allows us to view these competitive, complementary English landscape artists side by side.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre