NWF & University of Alberta PRESENTS - BOIL ALERT
BOIL ALERT
Directed by: Stevie Salas, James Burns | Canada, USA | 2023 | 104m
Follow activist Layla Staats as she embarks on a dual journey to explore the Indigenous relationship to water and the struggles she has grappled with her whole life as a Mohawk Woman.
This film is executive-produced by Calgarian and Nehiyaw performing artist Michelle Thrush and was an Official Selection of the 2023 Toronto International Film Festival. NorthwestFest is thrilled to partner with the University of Alberta International Week to present this FREE screening & post-screening Q&A/panel discussion!
Screening Wednesday, February 7th, 2024
Doors: 6:00pm
Opening Remarks: 6:30pm
Film Screening: 6:45pm
Panel Discussion: 8:45pm
PANELISTS
MICHELLE THRUSH - Executive Producer, BOIL ALERT
Alberta’s own Michelle Thrush is an actress and First Nations activist for Aboriginal Canadians and the other Indigenous peoples of the Americas.
She has said it's been only the last 20 years that Indigenous people have been able to tell their truth through their own stories, though she credits such luminaries as Tantoo Cardinal and Graham Greene for kicking down the doors for Indigenous people in the industry.
Ms. Thrush has had a very prolific career in the worlds of film & television, with numerous recurring and guest roles in the television series such as Madison (1993), Northern Exposure (1990), North of 60 (1992), Highlander (1992), Forever Knight (1992), Nothing Too Good for a Cowboy (1998), Moccasin Flats (2003) and Mixed Blessings (2007). She has also won numerous awards and special recognition throughout her career, including her ROSIE and Gemini Award wins for her role of Gail Stoney on the acclaimed series Blackstone.
She has also starred in many notable films throughout her career, including Isaac Littlefeathers (1984), Unnatural & Accidental (2006), Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee (2007), Skins (2002), Dead Man (1995), DreamKeeper (2003) and Jimmy P: Psychotherapy of a Plains Indian (2013).
PAULINA JOHNSON, PHD, MA, BA - Assistant Professor, Faculty of Arts - Sociology Dept
Dr. Paulina Johnson, Sîpihkokîsikowiskwew, Blue Sky Woman, is Nêhiyaw, Four-Spirit, and a citizen of Samson Cree Nation in Maskwacis, AB.
Her current research is focused on the importance of Indigenous womxn’s voices and matriarchal resistance to oppressive systems that are embedded in our settler colonial societies and institutions. Her forthcoming work details systemic injustices that Indigenous womxn face in colonial institutions drawing on the experience of her late grandmother and is written as a liberation narrative focused on Nehiyaw intellectual traditions and mechanisms of protection and resistance.
Dr. Johnson utilizes her classroom to reflect her Nehiyaw upbringing by providing story narratives and her lived experiences to her students. Her Indigenous pedagogies are front and center in her teaching practices as her aim is not only to educate you but to shape you to see the bigger picture and situate yourself in the classroom experience; a fundamental aspect of Indigenous education and methodological practice.
Currently, she is the Co-Research Director for Indigenous Engagement at the Canadian Mountain Network that is housed at the UofA.
