The Primal Mind

Ways of Knowing: A Navajo Nuclear History

March 2025 •English

The American Southwest holds a dark legacy as the place where nuclear weapons were invented and built. Navajo people have long held this place sacred, and continue to fight for a future that transcends historical trauma. This is their story.

Mankiller

June 2017 •English

The story of an American hero and the Cherokee Nation's first woman Principal Chief who humbly defied all odds to give a voice to the voiceless.

Dolores

January 1984 •Spanish

The Warrior Tradition

November 2019 •English

The astonishing, heartbreaking, inspiring, and largely-untold story of Native Americans in the United States military. Why do they do it? Why would Indian men and women put their lives on the line for the very government that took their homelands?

Chasing Voices: The Story of John Peabody Harrington

April 2021 •English

For 50 years, controversial ethnographer John Peabody Harrington crisscrossed the United States, frantically searching and documenting dying Native American languages. Harrington amassed over a million pages of notes on over 150 different tribal languages. Some of these languages were considered dead until his notes were discovered. Today tribes are accessing the notes, reviving their once dormant languages, and bringing together a new generation of language learners in the hope of saving Native languages.

Sweetheart Dancers

February 2019 •English

Sean and Adrian, a Two-Spirit couple, are determined to rewrite the rules of Native American culture through their participation in the “Sweetheart Dance.” This celebratory contest is held at powwows across the country, primarily for heterosexual couples … until now.

Shellmound

September 2004 •English

“Shellmound” is the story of how one location was transformed from a sacred center of pre-historic cultures to a commercial mecca for modern people. What began as a Native American burial ground three thousand years ago, was transformed first into an amusement park, and later an industrial age paint factory. Now, the tainted ancient soil sits beneath the glittering lights of Banana Republic, Victoria’s Secret, and the AMC movie theaters. “Shellmound” examines the decisions made during the recent toxic cleanup, excavation, and construction of the Bay Street mall through the eyes of the city of Emeryville, the developer, the archaeologists, and the native Californians who worked on the site.

Our People Will Be Healed

September 2017 •English

Legendary documentary filmmaker Alanis Obomsawin provides a glimpse of what action-driven decolonization looks like in Norway House, one of Manitoba's largest First Nation communities.

Attiuk

July 1963 •French

The people of Unamenshipu (La Romaine), an Innu community in the Côte-Nord region of Quebec, are seen but not heard in this richly detailed documentary about the rituals surrounding an Innu caribou hunt. Released in 1960, it’s one of 13 titles in Au Pays de Neufve-France, a series of poetic documentary shorts about life along the St. Lawrence River. Off-camera narration, written by Pierre Perrault, frames the Innu participants through an ethnographic lens. Co-directed by René Bonnière and Perrault, a founding figure of Quebec’s direct cinema movement.

The Buffalo War

November 2001 •English

Native Americans, ranchers, government officials, and environmental activists battle over the yearly slaughter of America's last wild bison, based on fear that migrating animals will transmit the disease brucellosis to cattle. Join a 500-mile spiritual march across Montana led by Lakota elder Rosalie Little Thunder expressing her people's cultural connection to bison, an environmental group engaging in civil disobedience and video activism, and a ranching family caught in the crossfire.

JazzTown

March 2021 •English

Denver’s iconic and Grammy Award-winning musicians reveal the secrets of their success and longevity in the music business while warning the young lions to whom they pass the torch to stay relevant in a marketplace both treacherous and brutal. The majestic Rocky Mountains tower over a bustling metropolis filled with steamy and romantic nightclubs where jazz flourishes on stage. JazzTown features never seen before live concert footage on historic stages that have now crumbled due to economic stresses of the Covid Pandemic. ~ Dianne Reeves, 5-time Grammy Award winner for Best Jazz Vocalist ~ US Senator John Hickenlooper (former jazz club owner) ~ Ron Miles (Colorado Music Hall of Fame, Joshua Redman, Bill Frisell, Ginger Baker) ~ Charlie Hunter (Snarky Puppy, Christian McBride, Stanton Moore) ~ Art Lande (Mark Isham, Gary Peacock) ~ Ayo Awosika (Session Singer on Soundtracks to: Wakanda Forever, Nope, Dune, The Lion King ... tours with Miley Cyrus,) and many more.

Ningwasum

February 2022 •Nepali

Ningwasum follows two time travellers Miksam and Mingsoma, played by Subin Limbu and Shanta Nepali respectively, in the Himalayas weaving indigenous folk stories, culture, climate change and science fiction.

The Four Corners: A National Sacrifice Area?

November 1983 •English

Documents the cultural and ecological impacts of coal stripmining, uranium mining, and oil shale development in Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, and Arizona – homeland of the Hopi and Navajo.

Those Who Come, Will Hear

June 2018 •Inuktitut

The documentary proposes a unique meeting with the speakers of several indigenous and inuit languages of Quebec – all threatened with extinction. The film starts with the discovery of these unsung tongues through listening to the daily life of those who still speak them today. Buttressed by an exploration and creation of archives, the film allows us to better understand the musicality of these languages and reveals the cultural and human importance of these venerable oral traditions by nourishing a collective reflection on the consequences of their disappearance.

This Was the Time

January 1970 •English

When Masset, a Haida village in Haida Gwaii (formerly known as the Queen Charlotte Islands), held a potlatch, it seemed as if the past grandeur of the people had returned. This is a colourful recreation of Indigenous life that faded more than two generations ago when the great totems were toppled by the missionaries and the costly potlatch was forbidden by law. The film shows how one village lived again the old glory, with singing, dancing, feasting, and the raising of a towering totem as a lasting reminder of what once was.

Great Falls

July 2012 •English

Professional, native and antiquarian researchers combine to investigate the archaeological history and modern legacy of Eastern Native civilization near Turners Falls, Massachusetts. They uncover possible evidence of a vast astronomical construct that covered a large area of what is now the northeastern United States.

maɬni—towards the ocean, towards the shore

January 2020 •English

An experimental look at the origin of the death myth of the Chinookan people in the Pacific Northwest, following two people as they navigate their own relationships to the spirit world and a place in between life and death.

Still We Rise

December 2022 •English

50 years on, the Aboriginal Tent Embassy is the oldest continuing protest occupation site in the world. Taking a fresh lens this is a bold dive into a year of protest and revolutionary change for First Nations people.

Taking Alcatraz

November 2015 •English

A documentary account by award-winning filmmaker John Ferry of the events that led up to the 1969 Native American occupation of Alcatraz Island as told by principal organizer, Adam Fortunate Eagle. The story unfolds through Fortunate Eagle's remembrances, archival newsreel footage and photographs.

Indian Rights for Indian Women

September 2018 •English

Three intrepid women battle for Indigenous women's treaty rights.