The Bechdel Cast - Rhymes for Young Ghouls with Jess Murwin: The Re-release

Episode Date: November 27, 2025

This week, we're re-releasing our episode on Rhymes for Young Ghouls with special guest Jess Murwin! If you can, please join us in donating to The Native Women's Collective -- https://www.nativewomenscollective.org/ Follow Jess on Instagram at @jessmurwinSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Start changing it with the Bechdelcast. Hello, Bechdelcast listeners. Hello, here we are. Bet you didn't expect to hear us today. Well, here we are. It's a fake holiday. So we're clocking in. We're clocking in and we are re-releasing an episode on Rhymes for Young Goals,

which we recorded back in 2020, kind of in the height of lockdown, if I remember correctly. Yes. In fact, the day this episode originally came out, I was arrested at a protest just to set us in time and place. I had kind of a fun physical response to revisiting this episode. Right. Yes. Oh my gosh. Yeah. So yeah, we're re-releasing this episode on this day that a lot of people still observe as American Thanksgiving, which, which these days, you know, more, it is more widely understood that the popular narrative around this quote-unquote holiday is completely false and that it actually celebrates genocide and settler colonialism. It's very much in conversation with Columbus Day for that same reason, you know,

the American celebration of genocide that is just really relentless. I agree that like people are coming around to acknowledging it, but it's still, you know, it's, here it is. And I, we wanted to both re-release an episode that we really love with a guest that you, if you're a long-time listener of the show, you're very familiar with, Jess Merwin, talking about an indigenous film that does not shy away from these themes and is very rooted in Canadian reservation schools. So if you haven't seen the movie yet, this is a great week to maybe. watch the movie and then listen to our conversation. But we wanted to just, yeah, pop in at the top and make a few notes in about the half decade that's passed. Indeed, yes. So during this episode, we talk about a media metric called the ELA test that was inspired by the main

character of this movie and that was originated by friend of the show, Ali Nadi. Since this episode was released. That test has been renamed to the Ali Nadi test. So if you're trying to look up the Aela test or whatever, the name has changed. But it's the same metric that examines representation of indigenous women in media. So, shout out Ali. We love Ali. She rocks. Be sure to check her out on social media, her YouTube channel. She's doing excellent work. And then we wanted to provide a content warning because both our discussion and the context of the movie involve things like sexual and physical violence, child sex abuse, suicide, just so listeners are aware of that.

Absolutely. And also, for what it's worth, unfortunately, since we recorded this, the filmmaker has passed. Jeff Barnaby passed away a couple years ago. Yeah. So, yeah, definitely, I mean, as you'll hear, it's a movie that we have a lot of love for and also for what it's worth i mean we we fully intend and would love to hear other indigenous and native filmmakers that you would like for us to cover on the show this is not something

that we want to just discuss once a year and so um if you have requests for uh or or just favorite indigenous filmmakers if you are an indigenous filmmaker and would like to come on the show just reach out uh DM us that's honestly the easiest way to do it yeah on instagram and yes if you are with family today, best of luck with that. And also that we are going to be making a contribution this week to the Native Women's Collection. We'll also, you know, we can link that in the description as well. Absolutely.

In the meantime, please enjoy this slightly abridged version of this episode. I went back through and just edited a little bit. made sure we really focused on the movie at hand and didn't go into tirades about me talking about catnipples, for example. So that stuff from the original episode has been trimmed out a bit. RIP, but you can listen to the original if you want the full cut. It's so true. But yeah, enjoy this re-released episode on Rhymes for Young Goals. The Beckdale cast. Yeah, I'm really excited for today's episode and for our guest. Yes, our guest today is a non-binary mixed-race migma artist, curator, and educator.

Their work focuses on reclaiming narrative space and fusing genre with social justice and holding space collaboration. You also might have heard and seen them on our recent live reading of Twilight. It is Jess Merwin. Hi! Hello. Welcome. Thank you for having me. I this is like a dream come true quite literally this is wonderful I'm so happy to be here

yay we're so happy to have you yeah it's it's I really like uh can't wait to talk about this this weird native movie that nobody's heard of we're really psyched to talk about it because it was originally recommended to us by um Ali who spoke about it when when Ali came on to discuss Frozen 2 a couple of months ago, podcast canonically, I think. What is time I've lost to say? It was definitely this year. Is it? It's October.

But yeah, Allie brought this movie to us originally, and we were kind of tipped off about this movie. I guess we should just say the name of the movie. I don't know what we're being so hugey about. We were talking. of course about Rhymes for Young Goals, a Jeff Barnaby movie from 2013. And the reason we're talking about it with Allie was, first of all,

because it's a movie that Allie's a big fan of, but also because it was the basis for the ELA test, which is the test that Allie created. Yes, and we'll talk about that in a little bit. But first, Jess, what's your relationship with Rhymes for Young Goals? Oh man. So growing up in like the 80s and 90s as a mixed raise like migma kid. So I don't, I didn't grow up on reserve. And I'm migma through my mother's mother through my grandmother. And she had been at what she was orphaned at a very young age. So she didn't really grow up in a like a traditional sort of way in terms of like learning how to do a lot of like traditional migma things. So you know, I was. growing up with this like identity that was very unresolved in a lot of ways and I felt like very conflicted about because it's you know being white passing but also being like I'm also an

indigenous person and didn't really know how I like fit and on top of that being queer and being trans and just dealing with like a lot of other stuff meant that I I ended up feeling like I couldn't really lay claim to anything you know it was just sort of like it It's too much. You can't be queer and native and, you know, mentally ill. It's just like too many things. So when this film came out, I had just been back in Canada for a couple of years because I spent some time living overseas.

And it was like, we have this expression in French. It's like a kudfud, like a lightning strike. And like we use it a lot. like when you're like fall in love at first sight or when you get like an idea and it was almost like that for seeing this film you know I was in my sort of early 20s and

and just moved back to Canada or like recently moved back to Canada and was sort of like oh my God here's like a film about migma people with people speaking migma and it's like the first time that I'm ever seeing this and all of a sudden it sort of was like this way of starting to reconnect

with migma culture like all of a sudden sort of like seeing this film and being like oh my god there is this part of me that's like that that feels something so profound in just like hearing people speak migma and seeing that represented on the screen and then uh and we'll talk about this a little bit but there was so much other stuff going on in terms of like indigenous rights and indigenous culture at that time and so it was like this was really the catalyst for me like reconnecting uh in a big way to yeah to sort of like migma-ness. That's incredible.

And one of so many examples we see of why representation is so important. Yeah, that's amazing. Yeah. My relationship with this movie is, it was not super on my radar until a few months ago. I knew about blood quantum. I did not know about rhymes for young gul. How did you know about blood quantum, Jamie? I don't know. I think it was

just, I was paying closer attention to movies that were coming out last year than I was in 2013 and 2014. That's fair. But then when Allie brought up Rhyms for Young Goals and said it was the same director, I was like, oh, and... Cool. Yeah. I think we did have a couple of listeners

as well recommend this movie to us. So it's been on our kind of watch list, our list of movies to cover. Yeah, I think for our like horror movies last year in the request, it popped up a couple of times and maybe that was why I was familiar with it. Yeah, but I'm happy to have seen the movie. Now I watched it three times. But yeah, I'm so excited to talk about it. Same. Should we

dive into the recap? Yeah, let's do it. All right, so we open with text at the beginning describing the law in Canada that states that every indigenous child between the age of 5 and 16 must attend an Indian residential school. There are truant officers who more or less police the schools and the community and who are responsible for bringing into custody more or less any child who is absent from school and they are allowed to use force to do that. Any force that they see necessary. Yeah, yep.

So we're starting off. Chill legal wording. That was, oh, yeah. Yeah. So that's an excerpt from the Indian Act. And we can talk a little bit more about this in terms of like context for the film because there's a lot to talk about. Because it's an act that's been around since essentially the beginning of Canada since Confederation in 1867. And it still exists today.

So that's, that's cool. But yeah, so that's an actual law that essentially, governs all of the federal government's interactions with indigenous people. So to say it's racist is a little bit of an understatement. And this kind of like opening package that Jeff has chosen here kind of helps like highlight a lot of the issues with the Indian Act. Absolutely. And I feel like we, we goofy Americans have a tendency to really romanticize Canada as this

place of justice that it, you know, clearly is not. And so, I mean, even just from the beginning frame of the movie, you're just like, yeah, no, we are desperate to feel a way about Canada that is not true. No, no. And it's one of those things, too, that like, you know, don't get me wrong. We have like legal weed and free health care, so pretty, you know, things are pretty good. But on the other hand, yeah, we do still have a lot of the systemic racism and discrimination not exists in the United States. And, like, Canadians are, you know, aren't necessarily all, like, super polite and super, you know, courteous. Like, there's, I think that we have this sort of angel complex with regards to the rest of the world where we're like, oh, we're perfect. We're not the United States.

And it's like, oh. The bar is on the floor. Like, all the native people in the back are like, mm, well. I don't know about that. It's like, yeah, have you read that law lately? Yeah. Or even just the fact that like since this year there's been like a half dozen high profile killings of indigenous people either at the hands of police or at the hands of our medical system.

You know, that's since like January. Horrifying. So. Yeah. So we open on the movie. It is 1969. We are on a. fictional reserve called the Red Crow Indian Reservation. We meet a migma family, including

young Ayla. She's a little girl who loves to draw, and she usually draws kind of like morbid horror imagery of like zombies and ghouls and whatnot. She has a little brother Tyler. We meet her mother, Anna, and her father, Joseph, as well as her uncle burner. They are all drawing. drug dealers on the reserve. And then one night, the adults, they're all smoking weed, they're drinking heavily, and then a bunch of tragic things happen kind of all at once, where Ayla's mother accidentally kills her little brother Tyler in a drunk driving accident, and then her mother kills herself.

Her father takes the blame for it and is taken away to prison. So that's, in like, the first 10 minutes of this movie that we're talking about on a on a humorous podcast. You know? And it doesn't, I think that there's like a lot of stuff even in that that we should talk about in terms of like depictions of Indians using drugs and being broken. But again, like all of these parentheses are kind of like paragraphs.

So it might make more sense to finish with like the plot summary and then get into it. Because otherwise, yeah, it's like. Right. We got things to say. It is so much, it is quite a bit of trauma in, I think, 90 seconds. Yeah. It all happens very, very, very quickly. Yeah.

And then there continues to be trauma after this. Oh, yes. Yes. So we cut to seven years later. It is now the mid-70s. Aela, played by Davry Jacobs, is now a teenager living with her uncle, Burner. And we also learned that Burner is kind of a snitch in the community where he, He kind of rats out his fellow man on the reserve to these white truant officers,

the main one of those being this guy named Popper. And Popper comes to collect, quote, truant taxes, which are basically this family bribing him so that the kids don't have to go to the nearby residential school. And we will also provide a lot of context in our discussion about residential schools and that system but it's know that it's a place that you don't want to go so ayla's friends sholo and angus tell her that uh sholo had gotten robbed by a stripper and can't pay the truant tax and ella realizes that popper kind of set up this whole thing and this i might need a little

but the clarification on. My kind of assumption was that Popper did that, kind of like orchestrated this whole setup and like robbed them so that they wouldn't be able to pay the bribe so that he could justify sending them to the school. Is that? Yeah, I think that's sort of the idea. And I think that also has to do with the fact that Joseph is coming out of prison.

Uh-huh. Like essentially Popper sets up Burner in that first sort of scene where he's like, they're at the fishmitten. And he's like, thanks for telling us you're here. so they'll get the shit kicked out of him by guys in the community so that like joseph will come home and stay in line okay right and so that's also part of like why popper would steal their money is because then you know he can get cholo and angus and ala you know scoop them up and take them to to st. Dimfina's to the residential school as sort of again like a way of sort of being like

you know and this will keep joseph in line got it right right because he gets released from prison and we also meet uh cyrus yes a kind of grandmother figure for ella and she tells a story about a wolf that's kind of delirious and ends up beautiful animated series that i didn't i didn't i was i i love when i don't see an animated sequence coming and then it happens and it's beautiful i loved it there's one there's one like that in um blood quantum too that's really cool. Oh, cool. And in both of the cases, like, Jeff's using it as a way to sort of, like, insert some of the, like, oral tradition and, like, the way that, like, our traditional storytelling works and sort of differentiate and distinguish it from the rest of the story. Right.

You know, and it's really interesting because, like, talking about the animation, I, you know, I also as an animator, like, love those sequences. And, yeah, I think. think some people sort of when they first saw the movie were like, I don't get it. I don't get why there's like an animated sequence and it's like, nah, you just got to like experience it as part of the film, you know? Yeah. So we hear this story about a wolf that is like kind of roaming the land. It's delirious and it ends up eating itself, which I'm interested to kind of talk about like the thematic implications of that later on. But so Aila decides to steal the money back that got robbed from them

and we also at this, around this time, reveal that Ayla has now gotten into this drug business ever since her father left for prison and her dad Joseph comes back and is like kind of disappointed

to learn that Burner let her get into all this but because she's an artist she's like a really skilled kind of crafts person of like rolling the joints and like flavoring them and, like, lacing them and stuff. Yeah.

I was like, she's cool. Yeah. She's so cool. She's so cool. She's really cool. It's also, she doesn't, like, one of the things that keeps coming back, and even one of the things that, like, in that scene, you know, burners, like, been drinking and smoking and stuff like that.

And she's, like, you can't roll for shit. Like, she doesn't, she never, like, she doesn't smoke weed. And that's, like, also part of, like, that gas mask is, like, this idea of sort of, like, yeah she's she's also sort of like not she's part of this world but she's not like in that world in the same functioning in the same way as the people around her she's not going to be a wolf who eats herself she's not going to destroy herself yeah so ella pitches this plan to her friends sholo and angus that they break into the nearby residential school saint d's is what they

like nickname it and they're going to steal their money back from popper so she orchestrated frustrates this heist. She draws a map. There's this little kid, Jujij, who, I think, does he attend the school? Yeah. And he will kind of be there as like the inside man. He's the man on the inside, but he's like 10. Yeah. I don't know what that kid is doing now, but oh my God, what a sweet kid? Like, I know. A star. He always calls Aela boss. Yeah, he's like, well, what now, boss? I, yeah. And Jujiz is like, um, I don't know if that would. be like his given name because that's like a nickname in migma. Oh, okay. Which means like little bug or little thing. Aw. Yeah. Yeah.

I'm a stand. Yeah. So meanwhile, Aila is having some dreams and visions of her dead mother and brother, sometimes as zombies, sometimes not. But this is kind of like a recurring visual motif throughout the film. And then one day Ala is out with her dad and they have this violent, run in with Popper and his cronies because Burner sold

them out to Popper and let them know about AILA's plan to break into the school. So Popper's like you wanted to go into the school, fine, now you're there. So he sends her there as punishment and correct me if I'm mistaken, but it feels like that's kind of part of her plan. She gets

sent there on purpose so that she can also kind of be on the inside or I might be wrong about that. I'm not totally sure. The thing, you know what, I've gone over the years I've gone back and forth on it. Caitlin like I feel like um when I first saw the film I was like oh this is definitely like like she's improvising sort of like this wasn't her plan and I sort of feel like now when I'm seeing it I'm like I feel like this was part of her plan in a way because jujig knows to come

and let her out of the hole uh-huh right yeah so like I think that it was her plan right I was also questioning that because I was like if if that was her plan galaxy brain genius Like, because the first time I watched the movie, it didn't even occur to me. But then on the second watch, I was like, wait. She's so smart that it didn't even occur to me that that might have been intentional. Right. But I also think that it sort of like speaks to the character that Ayla is. And like, because I think in a way that she, she talks about aging a thousand years.

And I think that, like after her mother dies. And I think that there is a certain wisdom in that character that's sort of outpaced, her age, you know? And, like, at the end of the film, you know, Joseph says to her, like, you know, I just want you to know you're a little girl. Yeah. And she's like, I was never a little girl. I think that there is a certain, she knows that burner is going to crack under pressure

and rot them out. Like, yeah. And she knows that, like, there's a chance of that. So I think that she's kind of got some ideas in her head. She knows that they're not supposed to go out on the water. They've been out on the water. You know, so I think that. I think it is planned.

She also, like, engages in that fight where she could have just, like, stood back. And I think maybe, like, oh, if she's fighting, that's going to be all the more reason they might send her to the school. For sure. In any case, she gets sent there. They cut her hair off. They put her in solitary confinement. That's a scene that still, and I've seen this film so many times now throughout the years, I still cry every time I watch that scene. That scene is so hard to watch because they used to.

to do that to people, you know? Yeah. And for us, like, your hair is really sacred because it's your connection back to like the earth. So I'm tearing up now even talking about it. So like the, you know, that was one of the things that they always used to do when the kids were taken to residential schools is they would cut off their braids. And I was doing this project with a bunch of youth up north here in Quebec where we were creating this like woven tapestry. And it was all made up of these different like lengths of braid that were woven together into this like five by ten tapestry and we had this one elder who came and sat with us one day and was like telling us about her residential school experience and was talking about how seeing all these braids woven

together was like so powerful to her because and this was not you know not something I had really thought about beforehand but she was talking about how like you know you would see all the hair too like after all the kids had their hair cut off just like swept to the side, you know, like all these braids, like on the ground. So it holds a lot of cultural significance in that way. Yeah. That scene was, yeah, that scene was devastating. And also if you don't really know whether she planned or not to get sent to St.

Dymphon, all of a sudden you're like, our hero is in this peril, you know, you don't know what's going to happen to her next, right? So it's either like a huge deliberate sacrifice or just her kind of falling victim to these horrible circumstances. Yeah, yeah. So while this is happening, her friends, Sholo, Angus, and then there's another friend of theirs

who I'd never caught the name of. Maytag? Is that Maytag? Okay. So they are prepping for this heist, and they go into the school, they break Ela out, they rig up the plumbing,

so that literal human shit comes out when Popper turns, turns on the shower, which... Very satisfying. So satisfying. Really good stuff. Yeah. And like a whole bunch of like male full frontal nudity.

Not that it was like you were wanting it necessarily, but it's like this independent Canadian film where you get to see like a whole lot of dick there. To see a little bit of shit raining on full frontal nudity. Right. you're just like you deserve this yeah and he's just at the lowest moment in that moment and you're just like yeah so good oh the catharsis that's been that's been kind of I feel like a discussion that's been picking up in the last couple of years of like how rare male nudity is shown period and then on top of that when it is shown how like the way it's shown is never humiliating which whatever speaks to who is making most movies but it would That's true, right? Very satisfying to see him humiliated in such a, like, primal way. I don't know.

Yeah. Oh, totally. And especially because you've sort of spent the entire movie up to this point just watching him and his goons kick the shit at everybody, you know? And it's like, I remember seeing this. So when I originally saw this film, I saw it at a festival. And at that point in the film, when Hopper's, like, lying on the bathroom floor covered in shit, just like,

I'm going to get you. People in the audience were like cheering. It was amazing. You know, it's like the end of get out. People were like full on like being like, yeah. Oh my gosh. Yes. This would have been a cool movie to see in theaters.

Yeah. God damn it. It got a really limited release. So I was fortunate to see it at a festival. But we'll talk about that. That's also something we need to like, yeah, I think people need to think about sometimes. For sure. Yeah.

Definitely. So he's covered in shit. Meanwhile, they steal the money out of his safe and run away. They get away with, I think, $20,000. But when Ayla gets back home, she finds out that her grandmother, Saris, has been killed by Popper's thugs. And then when Popper comes for Ayla, he beats her. He's about to rape her. But then little Jujij shows up with a gun. And another very cathartic moment blows Popper's head off. Aela's father takes the fall for it again. He gets carted off to prison again. And then the story ends with a, is that a family friend or a relative, Gisagu or Gisugu? I wasn't sure. Oh, the old man? Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. So he's like a family friend. Okay. There's a lot of like on small reserves, we always jerk that it's like, well, everybody's related like somehow it's like they're probably related somehow like right yeah he was the guy who earlier in the story had also there was talk of him having aged a thousand years because he had gone to fight in world war or two and uh came back like a thousand years older because he had like lied about his age saying he was older than he was to be able to fight and then um you know

experience a trauma of war and then came back um and he gives zela a really interesting piece of advice during that conversation too that they're having when when they talk about him being a thousand years older because he's the only other character that we hear referred to in that way and he says this thing that I ended up picking up on and and I ended up reading a couple of articles about it too like you know he's like courage is sometimes moving with the dead you know like as like bodies were sort of piling up you know it's like you have to keep moving and I think that that's almost an interesting, like, thesis point, I think, for, like, what Ala's doing in a certain way of sort of, like, despite everything, like, having to, like, keep moving forward, like, you know,

there are going to be casualties along the way, but it's like you have to keep moving forward because otherwise you're one of them, you know? Right. So, yeah, so he's an interesting character. He pops up a little bit in Blood Quantum, too. It's interesting because Blood Quantum also takes place on the Red Crow Reserve but in like a parallel universe. Because the Fish Mitten Strip Club is also in Blood Quantum.

Yeah. I love an expanded universe. That's so cool. Yeah, so there's like these interesting sort of like crossover points that kind of happen where like and a lot of the folks I think in the film weren't actors. I think that like some of them are just like people who maybe had a little bit of like outside of like the main cast

who are like Canadian indigenous like film royalty um glen gould has been in everything like you don't make like you don't make a native film in canada and not include glen gould because what are you doing um who plays joseph in the film he's incredible i mean that like the scene that i think like really i mean stuck out to me i'm sure everybody was the scene at his wife's grave was just so oh holy shit it's just like yeah he was he's incredible yeah um um Okay, so then this character shows up who we've seen here and there. It's just saying like, Ala, I don't want you to work in this drug trade anymore.

And she's like, good. I don't want to either. And then Juji, the little boy, comes back. And he's like, okay, now what do we do, boss? And she's like, I don't know. And that's how the movie ends. Let's take a quick break. And then we'll come back for discussion. A decade ago, I was on the trail of one of the country's most elusive serial killers,

but it wasn't until 2023 when he was finally caught. The answers were there, hidden in plain sight. So why did it take so long to catch him? I'm Josh Zeman, and this is Monster, hunting the Long Island serial killer, the investigation into the most notorious killer in New York, since the son of Sam, available now. Listen for free on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcast. wherever you get your podcasts. Hey there, Dr. Jesse Mills here.

I'm the director of the men's clinic at UCLA Health. And I want to tell you about my new podcast called The Mailroom. And I'm Jordan, the show's producer. And like a lot of guys, I haven't been to the doctor in many years. I'll be asking the questions we probably should be asking, but aren't. Because guys usually don't go to the doctor unless a piece of their face is hanging off or they've broken a bone. Depends which bone. Well, that's true.

Every week, we're breaking down the unique world. of men's health, from testosterone and fitness to diets and fertility, and things that happen in the bedroom. You mean sleep? Yeah, something like that, Jordan. We'll talk science without the jargon and get you real answers to the stuff you actually wonder about. It's going to be fun, whether you're 27, 97, or somewhere in between. Men's health is about more than six packs and supplements. It's about energy, confidence, and connection. We don't just want you to live longer. We want you to live better. So check out the mailroom on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your favorite shows. What up, y'all? It's your boy, Kevin on stage. I want to tell you

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the events of this film and why the characters are doing everything that they do to not have to go to a residential school. For sure. And I think that it would be good too to talk a little bit about the, a little bit about reserves and a little bit about the Indian Act because I think that there's like there's layers to this right it's not just the residential school

it's like it's everything you know and um this time watching it through too I was thinking a lot about like the violence in the film and thinking about how it's sort it's incessant like it's just like around every corner like Ayla's just biking down the road at one point and like somebody like comes out of nowhere and punches her and like yeah and that's you know such a visual metaphor for I think what it feels like sometimes to be a like a marginalized person whether it's you know you're you're black indigenous or like a person of color or whether you're trans or whether you're I think that there's like a sense sometimes of like things can come out of nowhere and kind of like knock you on your ass um so uh yeah just to talk a little bit about and and like feel free to jump

in too um but yeah so talk to talk a little bit about the Indian act because that's kind of where it all starts off, right? So the Indian Act was officially passed in 1876. I hope there's no Canadian history buffs who are like out there like checking my, because like it's the one, like I can remember meeting a person 10 years ago for like 15 minutes, but I cannot remember dates for the life. Well, most of our, most of our listenership are Canadian history scholars. So, yeah, but I do believe that date is correct. Yes. Okay. I have that in my notes as well. Awesome. Yeah. But before that, there had been sort of a patchwork of different colonial laws that had existed. And then sort of when Canada became like a country as opposed to sort of different like sort of colonies, you know, like between like New France and Upper Canada and Lower Canada, then it was sort of brought into law in a sort of more official sense. And the Indian Act, the short version of the Indian Act is that it was legislation that was designed to very literally like, legislate out of existence indigenous people. And it did that through a number of ways. So

the residential schools, which we'll talk more about, were part of the Indian Act, this idea that you'll civilize, and I'm using air quotes, you'll civilize indigenous children and assimilate them into Canadian society. The Indian Act also, you know, targeted women. So if you were an indigenous woman and you married a non-indigenous man, you lost your status. And indigenous status, our native status, which exists in the United States as well, is sort of like your only pathway for being able to access things like on reserve housing, like certain educational like scholarships and benefits and things like that are only accessible through your status card. There's other services and things like that that that are only accessible through your

status card. So losing your status, you know, was a big deal. And so we often refer to when women married non-indigenous men has happened a lot in the, you know, early days of Canada as marrying out because it was essentially like, well, now you're out of the culture. Goodbye. One less Indian. And, you know, there were other other things like the Indian Act did. You couldn't leave the reserve to get a higher education. You couldn't just like leave the reserve to go see a doctor. There was a whole system of passes that indigenous people had to have for a long time. Like it was essentially like a passport that said like, okay, I'm leaving my reserve now. And that, you know, there was no thought given to it's like, okay, well, we don't have a

hospital on reserve. I have to leave the reserve to go to the hospital. Or even just like, I want to go visit a friend on a different reserve. Like you'd have to like have that passport signed off on by the Indian agent. Who could also say no. So people's movement, was really controlled. People's lives were really controlled. And like I said, you know, disproportionately the Indian Act targeted children and women through things like the residential school system, through things like losing status if you married out, which wasn't applied to men. If men, if indigenous men married non-indigenous women, their non-indigenous wives would get status and all their children would get status. And they were able to remain a part of their

communities. Yeah. Jesus Christ So it's like It's not even like It's so blatant It's almost like a bond villain Who's like And then I'm going to set up the laser

And then it's going to catch you in half And then I'm going to take off the world It's like the Canadian government Essentially said from the beginning We don't want any more indigenous people And this is what we're going to do To get rid of them Yeah

However the double-edged sword Of the Indian Act You know I can imagine it's sort of like well, if it's so terrible and so sexist and so racist, just get rid of it. Unfortunately, it's really one of the major legislative tools that we have in Canada as indigenous people to be able to hold the federal government accountable because it defines what an indigenous person is. So, which is just like magnitudes of frustrating.

Yeah, absolutely. So originally, and this ties into the film, in 1969, Pierre Elliott Trudeau, who's Justin Trudeau's daddy, was prime minister at the time. And he introduced this, essentially this act that would have gotten rid of the Indian Act. This is, so this is 1969. This paper ended up becoming called the White Paper. And it was this really catalyzing moment for a lot of what we call red power or like indigenous like civil rights movement sort of stuff began happening because you know people were really hit to the idea that like if we get rid of the status of Indian which is what it would have been called at the time then the government

doesn't legally have any enforceable responsibility towards Indians if Indians don't exist they don't exist does that make sense right yes it makes sense the way you're explaining it's just that that's so there's so many layers of mind fuckery going on oh yeah it's a whole like it's a whole teramisu of like fucked up um which is terrible i shouldn't do that to teramisu terramisu is delightful terramisu will recover taramisu's got a good rap you know i feel like it can come back from this but yeah so so what the solution has sort of become you know is because we can't get rid of the Indian Act is sort of amend it. And a lot of these amendments, I think sort of the most recent big push of amendments, there's little things going through all the time, but I think

2002 was like a big push of like a whole bunch of amendments to it. In the 80s, we had a big push of amendments that allowed women who had lost their status through marriage to get their status back, which was a huge thing. You know, I have a friend who, you know, at that point in time was already you know like a teenager and she talks about how important it was like that moment when her mom gets status back which meant that she could get status and like because even though it isn't like having status is not what makes you an indigenous person sure it still can feel like a very significant thing in terms of belonging sure of course yeah so it's this whole sort of mess unfortunately um and the indian agents like we see popper in the film were the

enforcers of this incredibly racist law. So Indian agents had total like unchecked control. It was like even worse in some ways than sort of like, you know, how we talk about like, oh, you know, the sheriff in the old west and, you know, they could sort of make up the rules as they go along. Indian agents were sort of that except they were white racist assholes. So, you know, I've read different things over the years about like people talking about how like, oh, well, is Popper's attitude and behavior a little bit extreme? It's like, well, like, some of the stuff did happen. Like some of the stuff we know has happened because we've heard stories from people and it's also been documented, you know? By the time that we get to the late 60s, early 70s,

the Indian agents were starting to be phased out because we were starting to move into a new period in terms of like the Indian Act and like I said, some of those like big changes that were to come in the 80s. But at the time, we still had engine agents that were quite sort of literally allowed to do whatever fuck they wanted with impunity um you had indian agents in the states as well and they were uh this made me chuckle not because it's funny but because it's sort of again maccavillian uh the original indian agents were under the u.s war department initially oh which is like very blatantly like could you be any less like clear about how you feel yeah Jesus Christ Yeah, so, so, but what happened with the Indian Asians in the States is as we move through the 1800s and into the 1900s, they sort of transitioned into being superintendents for what the American equivalent of residential schools is, the Indian boarding school system.

And they were, that position shifted into more of a civilian role later on. But yeah, it was, it was like a government, a Department of War position. It was essentially, like I brought up in the twilight reading, it was to swindle people out of their land whatever way you could. And, yeah, it was about like this idea of like manifest destiny, you know? It's like, well, we've arrived and now it's ours. Like, yeah. So that's a little bit of background on the Indian Act.

And so like I said, the residential school system was established as part of the Indian Act. Under the mandate of kill the Indian in education. the child sort of thing, which is just like a real cool, chill sentiment to have. And so they started out, you know, we had Jesuit schools, especially coming into like New France. So sort of what is like Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, like part of Quebec, like New England sort of area. So we would have had like early Jesuit schools and like, you know, those were a little bit less rigorously sort of organized and those were mostly were in the 1600s, some in the 1700s, but

like I said, it functioned a lot more sort of like, what's that word, it's a missionary sort of effort. Like it was like, we're going to go and Christianize. There's nothing colonial about this. No, we're just talking about Jesus. And it's really interesting because we, from that, the migma converted to Christianity in 1604. And like, a lot of that had to do with the presence of like Jesuit missionaries in Megmagi and Megmat Territory at the time. But moving out of that

period, moving into the 19th century is when we sort of get officially into the like what we call the residential school period. And these were schools that were government funded, managed by Christian churches. So there was like different denominations that were involved. The Roman Catholic Church was a big one, of course. But like there were. presbyterians. I think Anglican. Anglicans. Yeah, the Church of England was very big. Just kind of not facilitating. I'm getting all tripped up on my words. But like essentially administering these schools. So like they were all run by nuns and priests and like Lakers clergy as sort of like the only attendance at the school. And we estimate that about 150,000

children, indigenous children in Canada, went to residential school. And is it safe to, I just, for our listeners who are not fully clear in what the intent was, the intent of the school is to take your culture from you and replace it with something else. Yeah, it was essentially that. It was this idea that, like I said, you know, like, it's the idea of, like, killing the Indian through education. So you'd be taken away from your community. You'd be taken out of your language.

So you only spoke English at residential school. They would cut off your braids, much like we see in the movie. You'd be wearing Western clothing. You'd only be educated. Educated. And sort of like European-centric history and like customs and mannerisms. In the States, more than in Canada, there was also like this idea of vocational training. But yeah, it was about westernizing indigenous.

kids because they were seen as being savages. Yeah, I like it was forced assimilation. And then in addition to that, it was also the like officials at these schools inflicting severe amounts of emotional, physical and sexual abuse upon the children. A lot of children died in the residential school system. Throughout the years, there was a lot of like malnutrition I read. I even read some cases of like experiments being done on the children yeah and there was just like not really much education happening it was just abuse no and that's sort of the problem right is that their primary goal was was forced dissimulation you know their goal wasn't to sort of build young people up so that they'd be able to stand in the world afterwards you know like like one would hope that

the education system does to some degree it was it was really about like you are bad you are dirty, we're going to make you clean and pure, and, you know, we can't bleach you, but we'll make you as white as possible. You know, it's estimated now that about 6,000 children died as a result of the residential school system. However, those numbers don't take into account. Well, one, you know, the records are not complete. A lot of schools, as they were shutting down, you know, especially in the 80s and 90s, you know, burned records. just like wholesale got rid of stuff was like we don't know uh graves were often not marked so there's been a whole process even now sort of like trying to figure out like people trying to

figure out where their relatives are buried uh conditions in the school were really terrible you know so kids were not only dying of like malnutrition but also of disease also of um abuse like at times the abuse would be so severe like there was one case that i was reading about where the children were routinely like electrocuted in like small doses and sometimes they would die because they were like as a punishment being electrocuted and that doesn't even take into account the I think what we see through Aela's parents is like the after effects of that abuse and how if you do make it out what is life like after that you know coping with all that trauma oh exactly and and you know that's just it too like how many

people, you know, their whole lives have had to struggle with, you know, the, the weight of that abuse, have, you know, people who have died by suicide. Like, yeah, it's, it's a very hard thing to put a number on it, you know, the fatalities of, of people coming out through the residential school system because it was this terrible, terrible, terrible, terrible, terrible machine that just like, like I said, you know, was meant to get rid of what the prime minister at the time for John A. McDonald, which was, he was, like, very famous Canadian Prime Minister from my back when Canada was sort of created as a country, you know, like, he was like the Indian problem. If people were seen as a problem, it was like, oh, well, we'll just get rid of them, you know?

You know, when we talked about this a little bit before the phone call, you know, YouTube were sort of saying, like, you didn't learn anything about this in school. I learned a little bit about this in school, but it's really only been the last, like, couple generations that we've even started, like, talking about this openly. So the last residential school in Canada closed in 1996. Yeah. You know? So like there are people my age whose like parents went to residential school.

You know, and their aunties and uncles and like were really directly impacted by that. Yeah. And we just didn't talk about it. We just didn't talk about it. We'd like there was a sense that for a really long time, even like in 2009, the Prime Minister of Canada, Stephen Harper was like Canada doesn't have a colonial history you know like we don't everything's great you know when we start looking at like the time in which the rime for and ghouls is coming out in a lot of ways it was like a big piece of media that was made about

this terrible terrible system and yeah and and and so I think that a lot of the violence and stuff that you see in the film was really done with the idea of like trying to convey just how destructive this was, you know? Was there anything, Caitlin, I don't know if, like, you had mentioned that you had like a specific timeline for residential schools. I don't, I kind of jumped all over the place. Oh, sure. And, I mean, I think what you covered was, was really helpful context.

I have just some kind of dates scattered through and some additional numbers. For example, like the 60s scoop was this? Yes. moment in history that was actually several decades long, where I think an estimated 20,000 indigenous children were taken from their families and placed into foster care or adoption homes, often with non-indigenous families. This was happening from like the late 50s into the 1980s. Yeah. So I know folks who were scooped and like, which is a weird way of putting it, but in some cases it was literally like, oh, you know,

you know, these social workers arrived at your house, and they loaded you and your siblings in a car, and then you never saw your siblings again, because you were all adopted by different families, which, you know, the term that we would use for this now is child trafficking, you know. Right, absolutely. And this was a government, this was government mandated. This was, like, government endorsed. So that's another way in which, like, the Indian Act has been used to sort of separate children from indigenous communities, right? is through things like the 60s and 70s scoop,

which really could be called, like you said, like started in the 50s and went until the 80s. And now another thing, too, that has become, that's gotten a lot more attention in recent years and is something that there's been a lot of call to abolish is we call them birth alerts. So what can happen, unfortunately, is that, like, social workers can essentially seize a newborn

from an indigenous mother if they deem, her to be potentially not a good parent in some way. It was a couple of provinces have abolished these like birth alert systems, but it's still upheld in Saskatchewan, and I believe Alberta as well here. So yeah, so if you're an indigenous woman giving birth in a hospital can be very risky because if you're not, if they're like, oh, you're kind of young, you know, or are you a single mother? You know, like essentially the staff will alert child services. they will come and take your child before even, like, the drugs have worn off from the birth, you know?

Like, it's a really, really horrific system. I also wanted to, I mean, this was, unfortunately, as I was watching this, I was reminded of a news item that I read not too long ago in September around just issues that would have certainly been affecting ALA, in particular, forced sterilization. as well, which when I did a little more research, I found it peaked in the years that this movie is covering. It peaked between 1966 and 1976

and 1976 over a thousand indigenous women in Canada were forced to be sterilized. And the reason that the story is relevant right now is because it's still happening. Yeah, like you said, you know, it is still happening. There's still a lot of pressure in terms of, and you know, in California as well, like there were a lot of indigenous women sterilized.

in California during the 60s and 70s. Not that I'm picking on California. It just happened to know those statistics for California. But yeah, it's still going on today. There's still a lot of pressure. Especially if women have any sort of even minor

health concerns. Like a lot of times there still is this pressure of like, well, we could just like, you know, sterilize you. If women are incarcerated, there's also pressure. Yeah, you know, it disproportionately affects the indigenous community, of course, because of colonialism, because there is still huge bias, unfortunately, with regards to, with regards to indigenous people.

Absolutely. Oh, I was going to say, on top of the 60 scoop, if you want to know some other sad statistics, I feel like we're just like, oh, and this thing. That's also really depressing. So today, talking to about the birth alert system, you know, even though the last residential school closed here in Canada in the 9th,000. 90s in 1996, which like, spoiler alert, we were all alive then? Wait, how old you, Jamie? We were all alive then. I was like, Jamie's young. Jamie's scrappy.

I was there. But yeah, so it's within our lifetimes, you know, and I think that that's a really important thing to remember. However, a lot of indigenous folks will argue that the child welfare system has taken over the place of the residential schools in terms of like taking kids out of communities. You know, you have the birth alert system. You also just have like tremendous like scrutiny and surveillance of indigenous families. And, you know, what should be shocking and upsetting to people is the fact that indigenous children represent 53% of the children in foster care in Canada, even though they only represent 7% of the youth population.

Oh, wow. In Quebec, it's estimated that one out of every indigenous family has a child that's in foster care with, like, non-Indigenous people. And it's endemic. It's just like, you know, if it's not something you have experienced directly, it's something that, like, you know other people who have. And when you start looking at things like that, you know, with regards to kids in the child welfare system, with regards to, you know, suicidality, with regards to incarceration, you know,

with regards to, like, drug abuse, like all the things that we sort of see in this movie, you know, you can draw a straight line from one to the other. And it can't be an accident at this point. Right. You know? There's just so much, like, paper. work and documentation of how things have intentionally been done, you know, throughout the years to make that this is the case.

At a certain point in time, you have to kind of be like, well, it's not even a conspiracy anymore because, you know, it happened. It's all well documented. And to speak to your point from earlier, that's just the documentation that still exists. Yeah. Right. What was burned and what was destroyed and what was lost and, you know, and, you know, and what will not come to light, you know, for whatever reason.

And on and on and on, unfortunately. Let's take a quick break and then we'll come back and we'll discuss how this context informs the film, shall we? A decade ago, I was on the trail of one of the country's most elusive serial killers. But it wasn't until 2023 when he was finally. caught. The answers were there, hidden in plain sight. So why did it take so long to catch him? I'm Josh Zeman, and this is Monster, hunting the Long Island serial killer, the investigation into the most notorious killer in New York, since the son of Sam, available now. Listen for free

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Well, that's true. Every week, we're breaking down the unique world of men's health, from testosterone and fitness to diets and fertility and things that happen in the bedroom. You mean sleep? Yeah, something like that, Jordan. We'll talk science without the jargon and get you real answers to the stuff you actually wonder about. It's going to be fun, whether you're 27, 97, or somewhere in between. Men's Health is about more than six packs and supplements. It's about energy, confidence, and connection.

We don't just want you to live longer. We want you to live better. So check out the mailroom on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your favorite shows. What up, y'all? It's your boy, Kevin on stage. I want to tell you about my new podcast called Not My Best Moment, where I talk to artists, athletes, entertainers, creators, friends, people I admire who had massive success about their massive failures.

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or wherever you get your podcasts. And we're back. I wanted to, if it's cool with everybody, share some quotes from Jeff Barnaby, please, about the production of this movie and just kind of his motivation behind writing it and sort of where he was at. There was an interview he did,

I believe, around the time this movie was first coming out in festivals with Muskrat magazine and he was asked by the interviewer let me get their name Jemais de Costa he was asked why he chose to have a female protagonist for this story

so I thought relevant to our interests and here is how he replied he said My Nation is a matriarchal society and paying respect to that archetype of a woman and the strength that is there particularly in First Nations women, it's imperative for me as a First Nations man who loves his mom and loves his wife and loves his sisters to pay reverence to their struggle and their

strength. I think women are awesome. Great quote. Wow. My mom had me at a t-shirt, you know. A new merch. It's right up there with our Robert Eggers quote. I was like, oh yes, women I've heard of them. Jeff Barnaby thinks women are awesome. My mom had me at such a young age. And, and didn't have a lot of support around her but still managed to make it work. She and my stepmom were a big influence along with my sisters and seeing what they went through at such a young age gave me a measuring stick in terms of the things

you can complain about in life. And then he said, kind of going off of that, why he chose the era in residential schools that he chose. I believe this movie is set in the year that he was born in 1976. But he says about that in the same interview, quote, I thought if there was ever a point in time that this residential school was going to crumble, it would have been in the 70s.

It just made sense to me to have a young native girl bring this institution of ugliness to its knees. It made sense to me because First Nations women are the language and cultural keepers. They are the epicenter of our matriarchal society. I've mostly only known strength to come from the women in my life, which isn't to say that men haven't been influential, but the rock steady power that doesn't waver seems to only come from women, unquote, which I think he compliments his wife for a long time. It's nice, but I'm not going to read the whole thing.

His wife is really lovely, too. Oh, very nice. Well, I think you see that in the film, this, this, like, ideology with, like, of Ala's peers who seem to be entirely boys, she is the smartest and most competent of them, not even of just her peers, of all the, like, adult men around her, she seems to have kind of the most awareness of what is going around. Because, like, there's scenes where, like, Sholo and Angus are just like, oops, I got robbed by a stripper, do. Like, Tiki, they're kind of laughing about it. You know, he's like, oh, well, no big deal. We'll just sell some bottles. We'll get the money back that way.

And Ayla's like, no, like, do you see what's happening? Do you see what we have to do? And she's by far the most competent. And, like, why is this? We talked about sort of having to age prematurely almost and having to be wise beyond your, years not in a like precocious child tropey way that we you know always take guff with on the podcast but in a when you're growing up in these horrible like systematic oppression situations there's no other choice you can't like it's that's just it hardens you and it and the fact that the story of the

wolf eating itself that becomes so important um to how shivia's herself and how we view her as the audience comes from really the only other woman that we get to know besides her mother in the movie of like she I mean I guess going off of what Jeff Barnaby said she was the keeper of that wisdom and passed it along for sure and I was going to say too that just like a little bit of like added bigma context um there is this huge reverence in our culture for not just women although you know like Jeff says you know it's a very matriarchal matrilennial um culture but also grandmothers in particular are really revered um you know as elders as elder women there's a lot of stories of uh gluccap who's are are sort of um how to describe

gloos cap uh he's a trickster figure and he's within traditional storytelling um but he's also like a protector figure for the migma um you know he was sort of helped when creator made the migma at the beginning, you know, it's a shape, the landscape. So he plays this really important role throughout all of our traditional stories. And there's a lot of stories about Glooskap just like doing stuff with his grandmother. And even the word that we use her grandmother, Nugumidj, comes from what Glooskap calls his grandmother, which is Nogumi. And Jij, that, like, adding that J on the end is, like, how you sort of like talk about, like, something being smaller. Like we talk about Jijij is like a small bug.

So like our grandmothers are like a small version of Glooskap's grandmother, you know. And there's also a lot of reverence in, in MiGMA culture for figures like St. Anne. There's a very important cathedral called St. Anne de Beaupre, where a lot of MiGma folks do pilgrimages to. Because like I said, we converted very early on. So Christianity has gotten very tied into our traditional culture. And St. Anne in the Bible, now I'm talking at my... ass a little bit. I'll be honest. I cannot help you because I never read the Bible. But St. Anne is Jesus' grandmother. And so, you know, she remains very symbolic and very important

for the migma in that sense. So the fact that Saris is really the only female figure that we know in the film, I think is like, is very emblematic of like migma culture, you know. And I love those scenes so much because they're actually speaking, Mi'am. She's making Bannick, you know, she's doing, like, all these things that, like, are so familiar and are so, like, grounding. And when we're in Sarah's house, too, you have a sense of, like, Ala doesn't have to be, you know, the smartest, you know, most sort of, like, aware person. She can just kind of be there and, like, is comforting. It feels like the closest scenes to where she feels like being a kid. Because it's really easy to forget that she's a kid because she has the weight of the world and then some on her shoulders.

But yeah, in those scenes with Saras, and I think, like, part of why it's so devastating to see that Saras has been murdered is because that's, I mean, one of the only times you sort of see Ayla relax the smallest bit and just feel, like you said, comfortable. Yeah, big time, you know. And it's also interesting because what you're saying, too, about her, I really see it as after her mother's death and her father's in prison, you know, Ella kind of has to become the adult, has to become the parent. You know, and like, you know, you both mentioned, like, that's not rare, unfortunately for kids who grow up in circumstances where there is, like, substance abuse or there's, like, a parent absent, for whatever reason, you know, and I really refer to, I always think about, like, all the men in the film, kind of as like lost boys in a sense because there is sort of like this waywardness this sort of sense of like there's not like any other kind of like parent like child relationships really depicted and sometimes it can kind of like feel like that in in circumstances um you know where there is so much intergenerational trauma is like everyone's kind of like lost and everyone's kind

of like separated from each other you know and so I thought that that was really interesting the way that they treated that in film. Yeah, particularly with Ayla's relationship with her father, which I thought was the way that that was developed was, I mean, really emotionally effective, but really interesting too, where it's, I don't know, every character in this movie is so multidimensional and so complex where it's like,

I can be mad at Ayla's dad in one scene and then in the next scene be like, oh, but I, but I understand where he's coming from. where, I mean, when we flash forward, Ayla is essentially her uncle's boss. She's clearly the brains behind the operation. And her dad is not able to, like, I don't know, get emotionally where he needs to be.

And the anger sort of is lashed out towards her when it is his anger with the circumstance, not with her. And seeing them navigate that relationship and reach, I mean, go full circle in the best and the worst way by the end was just so, so, so impactful. It was just, yeah, so beautifully written. Yeah, and sort of, you know, you're right.

And sort of like seeing that full, there's a lot of like circular sort of narratives that happened in the film. And I think that that's very intentional in the sense of like kind of being caught in systemic racism can often feel like you can't escape this vicious circle that you're in. like any kind of systemic repression but we sort of we open the movie with her father going to prison we close the movie with her father going to prison you know the amount of journey that he has to do

in between you know in terms of his relationship with Ayla is huge sorry my cat's eating my notes as I am trying to read them you know is absolutely huge you know and I think that exchange at the end of the film

where Joseph like just comes out says, you know, like, you're still a kid. I want you to be a kid. You know, I think that that that you finally understand in that moment what the stakes are for him and, like, the fact that, like, you know, he understands, even though he's like, I want you to be a kid, he understands that, like, Naila can never really be a kid, you know? Like, that's just not on the table. And I think that's kind of interesting in terms of, like, looking at this film is, like, in comparison with, like, other films about, like, teenage girls. Because I think there could be an argument made that in some ways, rhymes is a coming-of-age story.

Yeah. But it's just like, you know, you look at that and then you look at something like book smart and you're like, oh. Right. You know, you guys talk so much about like how, you know, oftentimes teen movies take place in a very like narrow sort of class. Oh, yeah. And, you know, it's sort of interesting to see the way that this film steps kind of

outside of that, you know, to tell this like story of it's like, well, you know, sometimes coming of age means having to be your. your own parent at, you know. Absolutely. Right. Yeah. I mean, and I, I feel like I would, I would qualify this movie as, I would, I wrote down all the different genres.

I felt like this movie touched on at different points, which is another thing that I loved about it was like there's just, there were whole sequences that were a heist movie. Yeah. There were whole sequences that were very much drama. There were whole sequences. But it feels like a coming of age movie. Yeah. To me. Yeah. And I don't know. I mean, maybe not at first glance because it's not an experience that we usually see reflected on screen. But we definitely see her come of age. And. Right. It's like, I mean, it's almost like you might not necessarily immediately recognize it as a coming of age story because there's no party at a rich kid's house. So maybe that's where. Right. There's no like, oops. I smoked weed for the first time.

and now I'm tripping balls. I got so dizzy at my friend's mansion that I'm hanging out at, right. It's like, but it, but it's like, yeah, a movie about a young indigenous teen girl in the 1970s and Canada, like, that is what coming of age would look like. Absolutely. Yeah. You know, and even I think that like, you know, there were even things like, like, I think that, like, I think that in. my own coming of age that like I like resonated with me in terms of the film you know like I said I didn't grow up in a res but I did grow up with two parents who had serious substance

abuse issues and yeah there were definitely things about like Aila's story that resonated so so strongly with me like on this very profound level and I think that's important I think that's so important in the media that like young people can see you know I was older than Aela when I saw than Ala would have been than when I saw the film. But it's a film that like I try and like show young people too

because it's important, you know, we're talking about like representation, you know, it's important to sort of see like, yes, it is this very brutal, violent, I don't think particularly optimistic story. But Jeff Barnaby talks a lot about this idea of like wanting to portray the res in, you know, in a way that's like true to his experience.

You know, and I think that like, Whether you're indigenous or not, if you're a young person who is living in, like, in a precarious situation with a, you know, that's because, you know, it's always because of things like that you can't control, then I think that there's things you're going to relate to in terms of Aela's story. Yeah. Absolutely. I mean, even getting back to the relationship with her dad, I mean, just navigating a complicated relationship with, I had a number of people in my family who had substance abuse problems, but you love them. and you feel like it's not especially when you're still a kid you can't really sever that chord and I don't know it's it's something you almost never see in teen movies and if you do it's kind of framed like a joke instead of you know a problem and that is something you know very sensitive

that needs to be navigated and another thing that kind of I guess I'm curious at what you both felt about this but I also was really affected by the I don't like Ayla is so mature in ways that I'm like I currently don't even know if I can be where the amount of grace and understanding that she's able to extend

to both of her parents consistently even when she is particularly with her dad who she's often pissed off at the decision she's making she realizes he's lashing out he's compartmentalizing he's not able to fully, you know, deal with what's in front of him. But she has this very, I mean, there's that scene with her and her uncle where she says,

the jail didn't break him, we did, which is her putting more blame on her. You know, we know as a viewer, she's putting a lot of undue blame on herself, but just the amount of grace that she extends the people in her life because she has such a thorough understanding of how circumstantial a lot of their problems are I thought was like really cool and and again just something you don't see that subtlety expressed in this genre really ever right and something you mentioned about the there's this kind of ongoing discussion throughout the movie about characters kind of having to age too rapidly on a maturity and kind of emotional and psychological level there's also this idea of um characters being broken and there is that discussion between um ela and burner talking about joseph saying you know like you said jamey like aila thinks that like we we broke him and it's not necessarily clear if she means like we is the family or we as a community or or what exactly but then there's another quick interaction between ala and joseph at the end when he's saying the whole like

you you're just a little girl and she's like i was never a little girl and then he says you know know, your mother was broken way before what happened, meaning like way before the accident that killed her brother. And this has nothing to do with you. And that, you know, is a reference to them becoming broken, being survivors of this residential school system and of this systemic oppression and racism of being, you know, forced into reserve life. And it's, oh, it's just heartbreaking. Yeah. And I think that in some ways, and I was thinking about this, I think a little bit closer this time because I was thinking about the podcast and I was thinking about other films that you've discussed that have like teenage female protagonists and and I think that

Ayla has a certain amount of like as portrayed as having a certain amount of stoicism and a certain amount of like restraint and a certain amount of like ability to see the larger picture that you kind of see crack at the end when she's like you know right before popper arrives when she's crying after she's found Saris, and she sort of says, you know, the last rule of surviving in the kingdom of the crow is never let your emotional guard down. And I think that sometimes for kids who grow up, or people just in general who grow up in difficult situations, I think that sometimes, like, in order to survive, you need a kind of compartmentalizing. You need to kind of, like, have a very calm, steady demeanor because there's nothing else in your life that is that way, right? You know,

And so I think that there's like a certain amount of that as well. And there's a certain amount of it too that like I kind of question how realistic it is. Because I mean, I work with teenagers, you know, and like, and they're all lovely. And none of them are going to listen to this, but I adore them all. And, you know, I think that there is a certain amount of that that is sort of like creative license. But it is really hard to like place Aela's age. and it's really hard to, like, I think that, like, a more turbulent character

wouldn't have worked for the film. So I think that, like, also from a storytelling perspective, you know, Aela being this rock is sort of important for the narrative, but also sort of perhaps a little bit idealized. I see that, yeah. Yeah. And I feel like that kind of, like, undue, I mean, that extreme strength and ability to compartmental

also crosses over into how she remembers her mother and how which was kind of another I thought pretty different incredible approach by Jeff Barnaby that I totally agree if she were acting you know like your average teenager may not have been possible but I I mean it's I forget I think it's her uncle or I think it's burner early in the movie once we flash forward and everything has happened who insults her mother in front of her and she immediately because she has I mean this this understanding of the circumstance of what happened was so tragic and so terrible and even though it was an accident that involved her mother you know she's able to kind of see the fuller picture and protect her mother's memory are you talking about the

moment where he like he calls someone an old witch and then she's like don't call her that and then he's like sorry the old lady yeah i thought he was talking about cyrus there was he i think he might have been okay then i misunderstood that because i think yeah he's talking about because she seems to be cyrus seems to be sort of it's at her house where like they're growing all the marijuana i think that they sell yeah and he he's so there's certain kind of debts to her that they owe because like she's supplying stuff and then and then yeah so and then they're like kind of moving the product around but yeah I think he's he's talking to her but even so I think your your point's still valid Jamie of like I mean everyone is broken and everyone's having to kind of compartmentalize

and it's and that's something that Ayla has I feel like just you were touching on this a little bit where in a world where there is not a lot that she has control over how she views her mother and how she holds her mother's memory is something that she has control over. Yeah. And it's interesting, too, because I was going to say, you know, even though indigenous women have been, you know, a target of colonialism and colonial violence through the Indian Act and in other ways, you know, indigenous women are also at the forefront of a lot of activism that happens and is still happening, you know, one thing that was going on when this film first came out in 2013 was the beginning of Idol No More, which is an indigenous rights movement here in Canada,

and in some parts of the United States as well, like at Standing Rock, there was Idle No More folks. And it was started by four women, three indigenous and one white ally, because they wanted to stand up against this bill that the government was introducing that would have changed not only a lot of indigenous rights, but also a lot of environmental protections.

So they got together and they're like, we're not going to be idle anymore. And it spread to becoming this national protest movement. It spread to becoming a bigger sort of movement for indigenous rights here in Canada. And that was started, you know, by four women sort of sitting around a table in the prairies, just like deciding, you know, we're done.

So there is like, I think in the character Vela, like, and understanding some of like Jeff's like motivations for wanting to create a character that way. Like, I think, I understand, like, that he's also paying tribute to women like that, you know, who have, like, held it together and who are, like, trying to make change and who are, in so many ways, taking all this garbage that the world puts on them and trying to, like, make change and do things that are different. And also, like, the compassion that it takes to take all that shit and still turn around

and be able to say, like, you know, I'm going to march and I'm going to, I'm going to write letters and I'm going to do a hunger fast. And, yeah, I think that that's really, really powerful. And I think that, like, so I think that there's also like that element, too, of, like, when I say that Ala is a little bit of an idealized character, like, I think that there's also a measure of that that's, like, paying tribute in, like, a positive way to the role that indigenous women play in politics and in their communities. amazing for sure um there was one thing that uh just kind of coming off of something that i think you mentioned katelyn about like the selling drugs and like being broken and i wanted to talk a little bit about that because i'm so i'm interested um in what your first impressions of that were because we're so used to seeing these images of like drunk indians and you know that's been so prevalent in in uh north american cinema since the beginning of north american cinema yeah um

so did you feel at all sort of did you feel any kind of way i guess like sort of like seeing those scenes in the beginning like i honestly i mean i my first reaction was i don't i mean i i knew that you know jeff barnaby is an indigenous filmmaker i'm like i'm gonna i'm on this ride with him he and I knew he was speaking to his own community it did like make me go oh no for for a moment only because I don't know I mean like we've all seen movies

where those stereotypes have played out and then you get no context for anything but this movie felt like it was all context for like what led to those stereotypes being so widely perpetuated without context entirely so yeah i think it it gave me pause for like a second but then when it was

clear i mean the first frame of the movie is context yeah um so i i feel like this and i was reading in just this same interview with him in muskrat magazine that he had experienced some pushback um from other filmmakers in the community that were just like well you're showing these stereotypes and like you know like I don't have any interest in seeing that portrayed on screen in any way and his response being something you've already referenced just where he was just like well I'm showing you my community and reflecting my own experiences growing up so like how can you tell me what I can't reflect my own experience right it almost it's like sort of finding a balance of like, do I do a disservice to my community by ignoring some very real truths of

what is taking place? Or do I, I mean, we talked about this a little bit on a recent episode we recorded on the Matrion about what we do in the shadows, where it was written and directed by both Taikoaititi and Jamee Clement, who are both Maori. And we were talking about how cool it is to see because there's like this kind of discussion around there's a lot of pressure on filmmakers of any marginalized community to only talk about that it's like if you're black you can only make movies about racism and that's your expertise so that's what you have to make art about and how it was like really cool to see this like really goofy vampire mockumentary that's like so funny and just like so silly made by these indigenous Maori filmmakers but then there's also like

you know taika made boy which is about his upbringing in his like Maori community I mean and you can speak to this as a filmmaker too just of feeling this pressure of like do I make movies that I want to make that are fun and silly if those are the movies I want to make or do I you know it's like this kind of ongoing dilemma. Oh, for sure. And it's, I mean, like, Taika also directed one of the Thor films, I think. Right. Yes.

You know, one of those Thor films. Tiny little Marvel MCU movies that no one's ever heard of. Right. And it's interesting because I think that, like, yeah, I feel so acutely where Jeff is coming from, especially because, you know, we all kind of, in terms of like filmmaking here in Canada, we all kind of have to navigate the same. systems, the same funders. So, you know, we're fortunate in the sense that, like, we do have public funding for the arts. You know, I wouldn't trade that for anything. But that also

means that, and, you know, this is changing a little bit now, but, you know, I've been doing this for, like, a decade close on. And, you know, a lot of the funders are not, like, BIPAC people. They're not queer people. They're not, you know, a lot of the funders are still, like, a very specific type of bureaucrat. So when you're talking about, like, yeah, it can feel sometimes like you're just ticking boxes. I'm sort of like, okay,

I want to make my film, but I want to make it this way. And it's like, you know, a funder is not necessarily going to be like, well, you know, you're an indigenous filmmaker and you just want to make like a zombie movie? Like, I don't know. You know, like, so

it's complicated some of the way that we have to navigate that. I also make work and want to continue to make work that is also in that genre sort of space it yeah it can be really it can be really difficult at times and there is all this kind of like pressure

sometimes to yeah like to not show certain things because like it always comes back to the reality of representation because you know this is like blood quantum we keep talking about blood quantum people are just going to have to watch blood quantum

we just have to do blood quantum for at Halloween next year. Absolutely. I will come back if you want me to. No, please. I waited like four years for that film. Anyway, that's another story for another day. But when you're talking about rhymes or angles, it's such a singular film.

It's a coming of age story. It's a heist movie. It's a story of revenge. And it's taking place in this, you know, it's a historical piece as well. Like, it's such a particular thing that like when the pressure is on you, it's like, you are the one that we are giving our small amounts of Canadian money to. to make this film, it's like, not only are you just like the only, like, at that point in time, you know, like, one of the most high profile, like, MiGMAF filmmakers, one of only a handful of

indigenous filmmakers. Right. It's also, like, you know, you've been awarded this, like, highly sought after, like, money, you know? So, yeah, so there are all these, like, weird pressures sometimes, and sometimes, like, as an is a filmmaker, you can feel like you're battling against, like, so many different, like, things that you might have to compromise on, you know, like, okay, not everybody's going to like that. I'm going to show this in this way. At the same time, am I working with a funder who understands my nation's culture, you know? Am I just being tokenized? Am I, like, wasting this,

like, tiny little bit of money, but it's the only money we have, you know? Like, right. So there's all these different things that kind of play into that. But, you know, we're starting to talk a lot more about narrative sovereignty, even just the idea that it should be indigenous filmmakers making indigenous films is very new, which it shouldn't be, but is a very new idea in Canada and the United States. So I'm hoping with that that there'll just be more opportunities, you know, and if there are more opportunities and there can be more people making films, therefore, you know, the one native person making a film doesn't have to make a film that represents all native people. you know they can just make the one native film that they want to make and then me over here I can make the native film that I want to make you know like and they don't have to be the same thing and it doesn't have to fit into sort of like this very specific expectation you know right and they can be all different kinds of stories and they can span all different genres

and it's almost just like well I'm wondering if like Jeff Barnaby is like this is my one chance to make a film I have to just like pack in every genre that I can It's not as though the movie feels muddled or anything like that, but it's like we need to get to a place where... There just should never be that much pressure on a single filmmaker. Yeah. Like, it just, it doesn't make sense. And I'm glad that he spoke to that issue and also just said, like, there are indigenous filmmakers that didn't like the movie I made. And I disagree with them.

And it is what it is. It is what it is. Yeah, and there shouldn't have been that much pressure on his movie to represent everybody, but like you were saying just that there's not enough opportunities, and so that pressure is created, and it just spirals out from there. And it's, I mean, I think that, like, even in a broader sense, like, of just, like, any kind of marginalized filmmaker, I mean, I would even include, like, female filmmakers in that.

Like, you know, when you look at somebody like a Catherine Bigelow, you know, often people are like, oh, well, she's so exemplary. as a female filmmaker because she's making, like, action films, you know? And it should be fine for a woman to make an action film. It should be fine for an African-American filmmaker to make, like, an experimental video work. It should be fine for an indigenous filmmaker

to make a alien movie, you know? Like, it should be fine. Because when a cis-het, like, a white, straight, you know, filmmaker wants to go and make a film about, I don't know, let's just pick. like a female coming of age story nobody's like well are you sure are you sure that you like can speak to that you like nobody nobody scrutinizes and and i know that like i know we pick on white straight men an awful lot and they're awful fragile but it's true you know like i i've had

conversations with like filmmaking friends you know people that i absolutely adore you know who are male filmmakers and nobody questions them about like why they want to make a film that they want to make. They're like, oh, I just want to tell this story. It's like, well, are you the person to do it though? Yeah. I'm like, well, you know, I want to make like a film where it's like two dudes and they travel through time. People are like, are you sure though? Are they going to be native dudes? And you're like, you can't win. You can't win. And I feel like we're fed this, this idea of scarcity, this idea of like, it has to be these like select few people who get to have the keys to the kingdom and it's just not true and like and so any shift away from that that we can have

I think is a positive thing I mean it's unfortunate but you know we're talking so much about like Jeff's work you know and like seeing his films and things like that and I feel like as brilliant as this film is in so many ways more people have probably seen Pocahontas more people have probably seen dances with wolves more people have probably seen dead man you know these films that like are super dubious and do a lot of damage in terms of like their representation of indigenous people and yet when I'm like oh hey you want to talk indigenous cinema people are sort of like uh I don't know what that is yeah or they might know they might know tyca but that's like it you know right um which is better than nothing but it's not enough sure it's certainly not

enough well that I mean there should be more indigenous filmmakers who are household names period Period. Absolutely. According to, and I don't know exactly how accurate this number is, but according to box office mojo.com, ever heard of it? This movie, I do consult it a lot. Mojo just makes me think of Austin Powers. I know. I'm just like, come on.

I'm not going to think of a bombshell and that makes me want to die. Oh, gosh. But this movie earned at the box office basically $1,500. because of its very limited distribution and exhibition. So, I mean, I think that's why a lot of people haven't seen this movie. A lot of people haven't heard of this movie. Admittedly, we were not familiar with it until quite recently. Jamie and I, so it's just a matter of their, and I don't even know exactly how to fix this

of getting the word out there. I mean, hopefully this episode of this podcast encourages people to watch this movie. It's accessible. I watched it on It's Villabon Hupla and like Canopy, which is free if you have a library card. You can rent it anywhere. If you want to take some money back. Yes. Yeah, I rented it on YouTube. Like it was, it's everywhere.

It's easily accessible, you know, and increasingly easily accessible. I own a copy of this film because that's the only way that I could like keep watching it after I saw it, you know, in the show and festival. but yeah people can see this movie it's it's i mean so i would say that we have to do this like we have to go old school on this so this is the plan that i've come up with in the last like five seconds i don't know why it's particularly old school except for um so everybody listening to the podcast you have to watch the movie and you have to tell five friends about the movie or you'll be haunted by an ancient indian burial ground that's how we bring it around

Invoke the burial ground. It's a pyramid scheme for good. Yeah, exactly, right? Oh, my gosh. Remember those emails, though, right back in 24 hours and send it to five friends or else you'll be killed? Yeah.

I feel like aunties always send those along. Anties that were the number one perpetrator of the yearabout. And it was like, I'm your niece. Why are you sending me this email saying I'm going to be murdered? Like, I don't know. 25 people, I'm seven. I'm tough. It's like, I think sometimes

like it's just like, yeah, I sort of miss like stuff like that sometimes because it's weird like it's sort of like it's paranormal in a weird way. But like, yeah, Auntie's being like, you got to pass this one on and like all your wishes will come true. You're like, right, your crush will fall in love

with you if you send this. But if you don't, you'll die. You'll be murdered. tonight. You're like, oh, okay, Annie Debbie. Let's talk about the ELA test. Oh, yes. Yes. Really quickly. And I wanted to talk to about ELA being a two-spirit character, but we can do that after. Oh, yeah, absolutely. So the ELA test, we obviously talked with the creator of the ELA test. But the ELA test, just as a reminder to all of our listeners, we discussed it on the Frozen 2 episode. But the ELA test was inspired by the Bechbel test, and Allie wrote it and named it after ELA from Rhymes for Young Goals.

The ELA test asks three questions about a film's character. Is she an indigenous or aboriginal woman who is a main character? She cannot fall in love with a white man. And third, does not end up raped or murdered at any point in the story. So obviously, this movie passes the ELA test or wouldn't be called that. that. But for all media, the ELA test, like the Bechbel test, can be applied to any kind of narrative media. And you can find the full list and all the updates at V-A-A-Test.tompler.com. And follow Ellie on Twitter. She's at Ali N-A-N-H-D-E. It's how you spell her last name.

Listen to the Frozen 2 episode. You know what to do. And then tell five people. And then tell five people. Is there anything else anyone wants to talk about regarding the film? I mean, I still have pages and pages of terrible sad statistics, but we don't have to get into those. I did want to just add that one of the things that I've come to appreciate about Ela is that I think that whether it's intentional or not, I think she can be read as a queer character, and a lot of that has to do with some interpretations of two spirit, which is a pan-indigenous term that was adopted in the early 90s to describe

LGBTQ plus indigenous folks. One of the interpretations of Two-Spirit is coming out of sort of like an Ojibwe perspective is that like you have male and female energy and they're balanced. Another interpretation of it coming more sort of from like eastern woodlands or like more sort of like migma and Haudenoshone traditions is that you walk between worlds. And that's what it means to be two-spirit. And so you see that a lot in this film where Ala sort of doesn't have like strict boundaries in terms of like the visions that she's having of her mom and, you know,

the dreams that she's having and also, you know, she sees Tyler at one point, her brother. You know, she's sort of having these, these moments where, you know, worlds are not, yeah, she's passing sort of between worlds. Yeah. She's also shape-shifting, which is. also a part of some of the the conversations around queer identity and from a traditional perspective. So she goes from having long braids to having very short hair. She's wearing costumes. At one point she has like that witch's face like on the back of her head. Yes. Yeah.

Which is like also a very interesting sort of like duality in a sense. Yeah. So as I've grown with this movie and as I you know continue to watch it and continue to grow in terms of too like my my own identity as like a queer and trans indigenous person I like understand her better now as also an indigenous character that's so cool yeah yeah and it's it's like it's interesting like it's something that like I don't think I I'll have to ask Jeff about um but I don't think it was ever intentional because it's never mentioned in anything right but yeah It sort of fits really interestingly in that way, with a lot of traditional beliefs. I love growing with movies.

That's the best. Yeah. There's so many things that don't hold up anymore. So it's really nice when you can watch something that's so cherished. And you're like, oh. You won't betray me. Yeah. I can still love you.

Something interesting, too, to think about in the context of this film. is the idea of unsettling. So we talk about unsettling in terms of like something that disturbs us, right? But we also talk about unsettling as a process of decolonizing, you know? You're becoming, you're not a settler, you're becoming unsettled. And I think that this film is such an interesting, an interesting representation of that of sort of like, Jeff Barnaby's leaning into all this very spooky imagery and all this very, like, you know, very graphic imagery even. you know like you really do see

Popper get his head blown off like there's a big check of his head missing yeah yeah so there's this sense of sort of like this desire to disturb and kind of like upset but also that that's a path to kind of like interrupt and get some movement

in what can be of sometimes a very stagnant conversation with regards to Canadian history and indigenous history in the country so it's like it's interesting that that exists in this film in that way. And there's also a conversation to have around the idea of, like, revenge or reconciliation, you know, I think that, you know, indigenous people aren't a monolith. There's always going to be people who, you know, like we were talking about earlier, aren't going to like, you know,

the type of films that Jeff Barnaby is making. And there's going to be, you know, people who do like them that don't like other types of films. And then, like, there's going to be certain types of discourse that, like, certain indigenous people are going to really support. And there's going to be other ones that they don't agree with, you know? But it's very interesting this conversation is sort of about like revenge versus reconciliation because in an interesting way, we can only really decide what we ourselves as individuals are going to do. And because of that, yeah, there's so many questions that kind of exist out there about like whether that is even like meaningful, you know, if it's just like an individual sort of thing. But I don't know, I'm a big believer in that like

our individual actions are important. So whether we go to the revenge side of things or the reconciliation side of things, it's just that we make that choice, you know, ultimately in the end. Yeah, I think that's kind of, it's kind of all I have to say. Yeah.

Oh, I do have recommendations. Please. Yes, please. So if people are interested, and I'll talk to you guys more about this off mic, but if people are interested in learning more about indigenous issues, if like this episode is like catching you totally off guard and you're like, I've never heard of Indians before in my life.

Well, welcome to 2020. I don't know where you have been living, but congratulations, I guess. But I would say that learning about indigenous issues isn't as difficult as we might think. So much of our school system, you know, has been set up in a way that maintains weight supremacy. so we have to do a lot of the work ourselves. And that can be intimidating, especially if you don't know where to start. For both, you know, Caitlin and you, Jamie,

like I feel like, you know, the process of learning about residential schools this past week, even though it's important, like, history to learn about, I imagine it was also very, very taxing, because it is very taxing, because it should be. It's genocide. Yeah. You know, it's not a fun thing to learn about.

It's not a fun thing to discuss, but it is a necessary thing for us to learn about because we have to stop it. It's actively still happening. And we have to, you know, make that decision, that personal decision, whether we are going to be with it or against it, in a sense. So with all that in mind, there are a ton of resources out there that exist for folks who are interested in learning that are really easy to access, free even, you know. And I will, you know, put together some of those. maybe we can time it so that like we'll put like put a bunch together for like the release of

this episode. Yeah, we can release a resource guide the whole thing. For sure, because there's like, there's so much stuff out there, even like really little things. Like, there's an app that you can download for free called nativeland.ca. Uh-huh. Yeah. It's a world map and like you essentially use it like Google Maps. You look up different locations and it tells you whose traditional territory you're living on. And just even like little gestures like that are really, really important because there needs to be that recognition, there needs to be that starting point, you know. I think that a lot of us feel very attached to the places that we grew up in different ways, you know, whether we spent physically long periods of time there or whether it's a sentimental

sort of attachment, and just being able to recognize that it's like, okay, that's Migmat territory, or that's Linape territory, or that's Osage territory, that's, you know, Sioux territory, then even just understanding that all of a sudden can be such an opening of a door because then it's like oh when you hear about like protests happening at standing rock it's not like oh those are nameless faceless like indigenous people protesting we're not sure what it's like oh i get it those are like dakota and lecota sue i you know i grew up on sue territory like all of a sudden you have a much more personal tie to that there's also tons and tons and tons of indigenous activists out there people like pam palmitter who are doing great work

and all their stuff is like on YouTube and they're active on social media so there's like so there is hope there is hope you can learn about these things it might be uncomfortable as any kind of unlearning unsettling process is but I would really encourage people to do that work because you know we've seen with this past year we cannot continue to live as black indigenous and people of color like we carry this tremendous weight all the time of this violence of this system you know know, even though I'm not currently in Nova Scotia, I, I am connected to the Migban, Nova Scotia right now who are fighting for their treaty rights. You know, I am, as an indigenous person, I am connected to the struggles of other

indigenous people. I'm connected to the struggles of black people because it's, it's all part of the same system, you know? And that's why you care, and that's why you have to be mobilized, and that's why you have to educate yourself, and that's why you have to speak out and and try and do better, you know? My grandmother who was MiGman is like, was like my anchor for my Megamoness for a really long time, passed away a couple of years ago. And her dying words were,

I love you all. And love is such an important value within migma culture that like, I love you all is not just talking about, I love you all as in like the people who are physically in the room there. But like love is something that influences all of our actions. You know, we have.

a lot of intention and a lot of thought that goes towards, like, how we are in the world in terms of, like, how we relate to everything, you know. And so, yeah, like, starting to educate yourself is, like, starting to take responsibility as, like, part of that interconnectedness. Yes. Yes. It was like a big date. No. No, no. I think as a lot of us who are, you know, on a pretty steep learning curve, honestly, because there, I mean, like we were saying, there's just so much of this. I mean, this is just things I didn't learn in school.

I feel like you hit the same three points in at least American public schools. And that's kind of it. And it's like the information is accessible. It's just making the commitment to do it. Like, that is all it is. Yeah. And I was going to say there's this,

this fantastic film that I just got to see at the Toronto International Film Festival but we'll hopefully get wide release soon and everybody can check it out it's a documentary based on Thomas King's book The Inconvenient Indian which everybody should read

but there's this fabulous line in the film at the end that is I think sort of very emblematic kind of about this whole conversation you know and it's essentially once you know this story you can't unknow it.

You just have to live with the fact that you know it now. So now that you know about residential schools, you can't say, oh, well, I didn't know, you know, and therefore it was allowed to go on. There are still residential schools open in the United States, by the way. I don't know if you guys found that in your research, but... I did. Yeah, so...

Absurd, yeah. So it's like, well, now that you know, you know, and go forward with that. And you can do it. I believe in you. Thanks, Jess. I didn't write this quote down from a YouTube video. I love watching YouTube.

I love going to boxofficemojo.com. Classic Caitlin. Senator Murray Sinclair said, and again, I'm going to paraphrase this, but he was talking about how people have said to him regarding oppression in the residential school system saying, like, you know what, that was in the past. why can't you just forget it? And his response is always, why can't you remember? No, and that's just it. And like I said, you know, earlier in our conversation, like, these things are still impacting us today. I still have friends who, you know, grew up in the

foster care system. I still have friends whose parents were in residential school. I, you know, this isn't ancient history. And that's the most fundamental thing is that, you know, so often we portray indigenous people as being relics and being like of the past. And even when I was up, I was like, I feel like the most like contact I had with indigenous culture was like a racist diorama at like a history museum, you know? And we have to remind ourselves that like indigenous people still exist and colonialism still exists and ignoring it is what we have been doing and that has not been effective. So yeah, so it is like, it is something that like I think people, especially here in Canada, are very, are starting to become a lot more aware of,

but it feels sometimes like such a slow process, you know, that like, I wish everybody could get a copy of Tom King's Inconvenient Indian and a copy of like rhymes for young ghouls. And it's like, this is your homework, like citizen, you know, like this is what you have to do this weekend. Is there anything left to discuss? Well, we know it certainly passes the Ayla test Because it's Ayla But I believe Caitlin, I had this movie passing the bacterial test

Yes, there's a scene at the end Where Ayla and her She's watching sort of like her own flashback From afar Toward the end of the movie where she and her mom Anna are painting something by firelight And they're kind of discussing what they're painting and why and...

I'm just weeping. Right. And then it also passes between Aela in series, I think, when she relates the story about the wolf. Yep. Yeah. In that whole conversation. So, yeah, definite Bechtel test passing. Yeah.

And, like, that's another reason that, like, I was so excited to talk about this film, because I was, like, I know that it passes the Bechdel test because I was watching it with that intention. you know seven years ago Hell yeah So that's that's awesome And then that brings it to our nipple scale So zero to five nipples based on examining the movie From an intersectional feminist lens And it's gonna

I mean it's very high I mean I feel like it could be a five nipple situation Yeah I think so And I'm interested to hear I feel like I'm trolling you guys in the video and nobody can see it. I mean, it's five nipples for me, but I also feel like I'm a little bit biased because I mean, I just, this film has meant so much throughout the years and I love it so much.

And just, you know, have a badass migma female heroin. Fuck yet. Like, yeah. Yeah, I don't really have any like notes for, like, I'm not, there's nothing that like rubbed me wrong or anything. Show me a more motivated female protagonist. With more autonomy. Like, she's running the show.

Yeah. And with higher stakes, I mean, it's wonderful. And again, that phrase, narrative sovereignty, and having this be an indigenous filmmaker, writing, directing, editing, this amazing character who, yeah, I have no, no, it's, I think the more we talk about it, I do feel like it is very squarely a coming-of-age film of sorts, just not the tone we're used to in that genre.

But it's such a, like you said, Jess, it's such a singular movie. And we are seeing a community that is almost never represented in movies. And on top of that, we're seeing Aila, who is not just dealing with systemic oppression as it pertains to being indigenous. also experiencing sexism within her own community and navigating that and just navigating all this stuff and she she makes mistakes she just yeah it's it's five nips for me mm-hmm the plan where they're like you know what we're gonna make shit shower down upon this guy and then see try to

steal the money like their plan wasn't maybe like Danny Ocean could never can never He could never But I'm like It's great and I The catharsis of it is great But I'm just like Like he's right there He knows that you're there

Maybe like steal the money first And then like you know Just like she has to see it It's like teenagers Yeah Of course they're going to come up with A bit of a hairbrain plan And it works

So yeah And it's so rewarding too Because the shit like at one point When they're putting the shit like in the van Like getting ready to go to the school they're like yeah everybody contributed and I can just like I can just picture like everybody just being like oh you need some shit you like we got that yeah and it's just like the fact that it's like a community effort to like shit on this opie they crowdsource the shit it's yeah

I love it and that sequence we didn't talk about it too much but that sequence is it's just like another way this movie is so cool where there's I mean understandably so there's so many very very emotionally heavy scenes and plot lines in this movie and then for this i mean it fits very well inside of what the movie is but it's also this moment of like you're in oceans 11 for a second but it's it fits very clearly inside this world and it's like fun and they win and it's exciting and it's just uh that sequence is so cool Agreed. I mean, and even just like we talked about the little bit of criticism or like some pushback that Jeff Barnaby received like from his own community like are you really going to like show these stereotypes which again like I don't this is an exploration of what like systemic racism and oppression does to an indigenous community does to families and does to individuals and like that's this is just an authentic story about this young woman, this teenage girl and it's just.

an incredibly crafted and told story. What more could he ask for? Oh, so glad you'd like it. I'm so glad you're like it. Because I think there's also like this nervousness on my part of like, I'm like, oh, no, what if they don't like it? I'm going to have to sit on this call and, like, explain, like, why it's a brilliant film, but I'm so glad you guys liked it.

And, and, yeah, and thank you so much for this opportunity and for holding this space for indigenous film and for me and for Aela and yeah, thank you so much. Thank you for being here and providing all your insights, information, everything. Thank you so much. We're extremely grateful and just like stoked that you're on the show. Yeah, thank you. And there you have it. That's our re-released episode on Rhymes for Young Goals. You can follow our guest, Jess, on Instagram at Jess Merwin. You can follow us at Bechtelcast as well as subscribe to our Patreon, aka The Matrion. We love The Matrion. It is where for $5 a month you can get two bonus episodes with Just Caitlin and myself on a theme of usually yours and occasionally are choosing if we

didn't like what you chose. So it's always a great time to join the Matrion. It's a really fun community of people over there. You get a say in the episodes, you get, you know, when we go on tour, you get pre-tickets, you get discounts, you get bonus merch if you come to our live shows. It's really fun. This upcoming month, we're going to be covering some holiday films that you've been asking us to do for years and we're finally doing. We're doing the Family Stone and Black Christmas over there. So true. So meet us over there. The link is in the description. It's a great way to spend five dollars. And speaking of spending money or not spending money, the last thing I want to say is I'd like to encourage listeners to participate in the economic blackout that is currently

happening. I've seen different date ranges for different versions of this, but more or less between November 25th, so it's already started to December 2nd, there's a huge economic blackout where rather than participating in Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales from huge corporations, exercise the power you have as a consumer to withhold your money because that will speak volumes if enough people do it. Absolutely. And in addition to, as we've discussed in the show before, keeping up with and observing the BDS boycott list as well.

and rerouting maybe some of that money that you would have been spending at a business corp or wherever the fuck you spend your money and rerouting it to places like the Native Women's Collective, which we mentioned at the beginning of the episode, you can give to them in the description or, you know, in addition, you know, get involved in or at very least aware of mutual aid efforts in your community. You know, you can, obviously, if you're not able to donate your money, you can donate your time. There's just a massive, massive need for you and whatever you are able to do, whether that's financial, whether that's donating your time, and just, you know, get involved in your community because that's the only way that we weather these kinds of horrific times that we find ourselves in. So if you're able to do it, you absolutely should. and it's just, you know, a great way to build community and focus on community. Absolutely.

My last plug is listen to We the Unhoused. It's a show I also produce on IHeart Radio that discusses specifically issues that affect the unhoused told by unhoused people and their advocates. There's a really great episode coming out this coming Tuesday that interviews a wonderful filmmaker named Caitlin Cren, who just released a wonderful documentary on PBS about the queer unhoused community in New York. It's a really great movie. It's called Outcast Nation. It's a great interview with her. And yeah, that's my little plug. With that, thank you for listening. Be safe. Take care of yourself and take care of each other. Bye. Bye.

The Bechtelcast is a production of I-Heart Media, hosted and produced by me, Jamie Loftus. And me, Caitlin Durante. The podcast is also produced by Sophie Lichten. And edited by Caitlin Durante. Ever heard of them? That's me. And our logo and merch, and all of our artwork, in fact, are designed by Jamie Loftus, ever heard of her? Oh, my God. And our theme song, by the way, was composed by Mike Kaplan. With vocals by Catherine Voskerzensky. and a special thanks to the one and only Aristotle Acevedo. For more information about the podcast, please visit Linktree slash Bechtelcast.

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