Article content continued

The two filmmakers gave Kunuk a private screening of When They Awake but eventually learned that the flight they had hoped to take out of Igloolik had been grounded 60 kilometres south in the tiny community of Hall Beach. It meant that the two could have been stuck for over a week in Igloolik, which would have put a major wrench in the tour. But, coincidentally, Marcellino had a friend who lived in Hall Beach and began hatching a plan. How hard could it be to get to Hall Beach? All they needed was a hunter with a snowmobile, GPS and knowledge of the land.

“The next few hours we had, we spent trying to find the right hunter and trying to get this done before 6 p.m. before gas stations closed,” says Marcellino, in an interview. “By six we were on the road and we crossed to the other side and got to my friend’s place just in time for dinner.”

It’s a great story, but it also points to a larger “think-outside-the-box” approach the two filmmakers have adopted when getting their film out to the Indigenous communities celebrated in When they Awake. Three and a half years in the making, the documentary is a labour of love that chronicles the renaissance of Indigenous musicians from across Canada who are using their talents to celebrate their culture and address colonization and other dark aspects of their history. The documentary takes its title from a quote by Metis leader Louis Riel, who in 1885 said, “My people will sleep for 100 years, but when they awake, it will be the artists who give them their spirits back.”