America is in the news right now. Police are rioting brutally against protestors who have been demonstrating against police brutality for months now. Black Lives Matter, but the police don’t seem to have received the message.

There’s a perception that Canada is immune or exempt from this type of action and that when you cross the border from America into Canada, everything bad just sort of stops. This, of course, could not be further from the truth. Canada has a long and storied history of mistreating the indigenous peoples of our country while portraying that history as peaceful.

Inconvenient Indian, the new film from director Michelle Latimer based on the book by Thomas King, aims to shine a light on our perceptions of Indigenous culture in Canada and America and, in the process, becomes one of the most important pieces of Canadian media of the year.

Continue reading “VIFF Review: ‘Inconvenient Indian’ is a powerful look at the past, and present, of Indigenous life in Canada”