History of Indigenous film and television
I'm not an aficionado of the Toronto International Film Festival much, but the other day we did get to a showing of Edge of the Knife , or Sgaaway K'uuna , the first feature film made entirely in the Haida language. It is co-directed by Gwaii Edenshaw, who is Haida, and Helen Haig-Brown, who is Tsilhquo'tin, and they had the assistance of the film team that made the terrific Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner. There must be a good chance it will be seen this winter in major cities and specialty cinema venues. Edge of the Knife and Atanarjuat are powerful demonstrations why cultural appropriation is a problem. Oh, says defenders of the practice, a good novelist (or film-maker) will grasp the truth of the culture, because that is what artists do, that is how an artist works. Watch Edge of the Knife or (even more so) Atanarjuat and you quickly become sure no Euro-Canadian would have made it. Worth the price for that alone. Edge of the Knife presents a traditio...
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