Documented Screening Program: Sugarcane

Sugarcane, the debut feature documentary from Julian Brave NoiseCat and Emily Kassie is an epic cinematic portrait of a community during a moment of international reckoning. Premiering at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival where it won the Directing Award: U.S. Documentary, the documentary is now nominated for Best Documentary at the 2025 Academy Awards®.

In 2021, evidence of unmarked graves was discovered on the grounds of an Indian residential school run by the Catholic Church in Canada, sparking a national outcry and setting off searches across North America. After years of silence, the forced separation, assimilation and abuse many children experienced at these segregated boarding schools was finally coming to light. When Kassie, a journalist and filmmaker, asked her old friend and colleague, NoiseCat, to help her document the Williams Lake First Nation investigation of St Joseph’s Mission, she never imagined just how close this story was to his own family.

Set amidst a groundbreaking investigation, Sugarcane illuminates the heartbreak and beauty of a community breaking cycles of intergenerational trauma and finding the strength to survive.

Ticketing information: Tickets are $14 for AIDC delegates and are available to purchase via the ACMI website or in-person at the ACMI ticket desk.

 

Image credit: Julian Brave NoiseCat and his father Ed Archie NoiseCat look down at the Williams Lake Stampede from the top of “Indian Hill” on their roadtrip back to St. Joseph’s Mission, where Ed was born. (Credit: Emily Kassie/Sugarcane Film LLC)

PRESENTED BY