Fire Song: A Great Film – but an opportunity missed

By Beverly Sabourin and Peter Globensky
Sometime back we had the pleasure of creating an innovative literacy project in Thunder Bay involving the numerous talents of the Cree playwright and author Tomson Highway (The Rez Sisters, Kiss of the Fur Queen).

The project examined Aboriginal literature in Canada and how those stories influenced the evolution of the many Aboriginal identities in our shared country. Part of the project involved a cataloging of the works of Aboriginal authors in Canada. To accomplish this task, we interviewed a dozen applicants for the position of research associate. Every applicant except one was Aboriginal and all were undertaking graduate work at a post-secondary institution.

Had these interviews been conducted 25 years ago we would have been fortunate to have had one Aboriginal candidate – let alone candidates working on their graduate degrees. To us this was proof positive that Aboriginal youth continue to move beyond the circles of dependency and creating futures for themselves.

The very same trajectory of success can be charted for the growth of Aboriginal films and media produced and directed by Aboriginal artists in Canada. From very modest beginnings, often fuelled by a vibrant National Film Board, to an award-winning mini-industry, a report recently commissioned by ImagiNATIVE concluded that “. . . .Canada is considered to be one of the “pillars” of Indigenous cinema.

Recently, the North of Superior Film Association, a reel innovative cinema group premiered Fire Song to a Thunder Bay audience. And for good reason! Filmed in the Fort William and Wabigoon First Nations the film was co-produced by Thunderstone Productions whose award-winning President, Michelle Derosiers calls Thunder Bay home. Directed by Adam Garnet Jones, the film features a vibrant cast of young and talented Aboriginal actors.

It tells the story of a young man (Shane) seeking to define his own sexual identify and his constantly interrupted commitment to pursue an education which will take him away from his own community. His story and his dream both unfold and unravel against a backdrop of tragedy and the “business-as-usual” social issues which plague so many Aboriginal communities. Shane has just lost his sister to suicide. His mother appears unable to emerge from an abiding grief over the suicide loss of her daughter. The film then careens through other tragedies and challenges. Obviously angry and conflicted Shane wants out, all the while holding tight to the Holy Grail of pursuing a university degree in Toronto, yet lacking the financial means to do so.

You would think “uplifting” could never apply to this tightly-woven, initially despairing film! But the ending does uplift – and it was worth waiting for it. But there was one disquieting aspect to the film.

At the recent world premiere at TIFF, the intro suggested “With sensitivity and intelligence, Fire Song confronts some of the most pressing questions facing First Nations communities.” Confront would not be the word we would use. Even the word examine would not do. The film missed an opportunity to do so. The only explicit reference to an issue came from the traditional Elder when she was forced through love and family loyalty to alter her view of two-spirited people. Not that the film avoided the “new normal” in so many First Nations communities.

Fire Song played out in front of a backdrop of inadequate housing, alcoholism, sexual abuse and incest, drug addictions and even a “corner store” for bootlegging booze and peddling soul-killing narcotics owned by a gun-tottin’ mama! But the film served this up as a backdrop which perhaps made the assumption that this is the way things were with no one railing against it. Even the ending of the film suggested that escape was the preferred option.

With many, when a vista is spread out before them full of large swatches of leafless trees as far as the eye can see, it may help to point out that it is a damaging blight, and not just the changing of the seasons. Still, it is a film very much worth seeing – if only the dots viewers are expected to connect were amplified as being unacceptable.

Beverly Sabourin, recently retired as the Vice-Provost of Aboriginal Initiatives at Lakehead University, is a member of the Pic Mobert Ojibwe. Peter Globensky is a former senior policy advisor on Aboriginal Affairs in the Office of the Prime Minister and recently retired as CEO of the Canadian Council of Ministers of the Environment. They invite your comments at basa1@shaw.ca