Ballads Not Bullets: Tom Jackson

An intimate look into the mind of Niall McNeil, an artist and performer with Down syndrome, and his unique chosen family. In Lay Down Your Heart, Niall introduces us to his many “family members,” his multiple “children,” his renowned “ex-wife” and director of the film Marie Clements, and other bonds forged through open-hearted creativity.

The Road Forward is an electrifying musical documentary that connects a pivotal moment in Canada’s civil rights history—the beginnings of Indian Nationalism in the 1930s—with the powerful momentum of First Nations activism today. Interviews and musical sequences describe how a tiny movement, the Native Brotherhood and Sisterhood, grew to become a successful voice for change across the country. Visually stunning, The Road Forward seamlessly connects past and present through superbly produced story-songs with soaring vocals, blues, rock, and traditional beats.

Cree Matriarch Aline Spears survives Canada's residential school system to continue her family's generational fight in the face of systemic starvation, racism, and sexual abuse. The story unfolds over one hundred years with a cumulative force that propels us into the future.

Cree matriarch Aline Spears survives a childhood in Canada’s residential school system to continue her family’s generational fight in the face of systemic starvation, racism, and sexual abuse. She uses her uncanny ability to understand and translate codes into working for a special division of the Canadian Air Force as a Cree code talker in World War II. The story unfolds over 100 years with a cumulative force that propels us into the future.

Red Snow is a dramatic adventure that begins when Dylan, a Gwich'in soldier from the Canadian Arctic, is caught in an ambush in Panjwayi, Afghanistan. His capture and interrogation by a Taliban Commander releases a cache of memories connected to the love and death of his Inuit cousin, Asana, and binds him closer to a Pashtun family as they escape across treacherous landscapes and through a blizzard that becomes their key to survival.

Rebecca has returned home to be with her dying father. His last wish is that she track down her mother, an aboriginal woman who has long been missing. As she turns over the stones that hide the debris of the unwanted and forgotten, she is drawn into the mysteries of ten missing native women whose spirits lead Rebecca to the killer who still haunts the alleys, streets and hotels of this urban wasteland.

Carmen Aguirre and Tony Nardi star in a remarkable story of friends, lovers, seekers and thieves. Set at the intersection of the Latin American, First Nations and Italian communities, "Bella Ciao!" captures a struggle towards solidarity in East Vancouver's urban mix.