"Sugarcane" with Julian Brave Noisecat & Emily Kassie

Top Docs: Award-Winning Documentary Filmmakers

Kicking off our on-the-ground coverage of Sundance 2024, Julian Brave Noisecat and Emily Kassie join Mike to discuss their new film, “Sugarcane”.

In this film, they explore the legacy of the St. Joseph Mission, one of many segregated residential schools promulgated by the Canadian government and run by the Catholic Church. The stories they tell are deeply personal (Julian’s grandmother attended the school, and his father was born there) as well illustrative of a wider history of abuse within the schools. As they explain, they deploy and reshape various filmic conventions–the Western, archival, the travel doc–in innovative ways to do justice to the lives and stories of their subject. The result is a many-layered testament to survival and renewal despite deep, still-ongoing pain.

Thanks to Amos Cochran of Edit/Score for hosting our 2024 Sundance interviews. Edit/Score is a new music library with an innovative approach to finding music for your film. Listen to the library and learn more at editscoremusic.com

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