Few filmmakers are making waves at TIFF quite like Darlene Naponse. After turning heads with Falls Around Her and Stellar, she’s back with Aki, a stunning wordless love letter to the land and her home community of Atikameksheng Anishnawbek. With her signature mix of bold experimentation, political edge, and jaw-dropping visuals, Naponse proves once again why she’s one of the most exciting Canadian voices working today and absolutely a major talent to watch. I had the chance to catch up with Darlene to talk about all things Aki.
JG: Aki is almost entirely wordless, instead relying on images, soundscapes, and the land. What drew you to this approach?
Darlene Naponse: I do a lot of sovereignty work and a lot of work within my community, and I wanted to tell our story. When I started putting this together, I knew I couldn’t do it in English. I don’t speak fully in Nishnaabemwin. What I do know is I can tell a story through visuals, words, and poetry. I mean, like, without words, through the poetry of our people and the land. So that’s where it came from.
JG: The land itself is a central character in Aki. How did filming in your home community of Atikameksheng Anishnawbek shape the way you chose to capture its beauty, its rhythms, and even some of the issues there?
Darlene Naponse: I was born and raised there, and I still live there now as a filmmaker. I lived in Toronto for a couple of years, and then I was like, No, I’m going to go home. And so I made my career living on the reserve and living in community. It’s my everyday life, and I love where I live and I love my community so much, so that is what I see every day. In a certain sense, I just wanted to capture the rhythm of the community. We live by the seasons, we enjoy going out and playing and hunting and fishing and all of those things. When we were shooting, we didn’t have a script or anything. It was just like what was happening that day. That’s what we did. That’s what we shot.Â
JG: You mentioned that you didn’t go into it with a script. How did you balance the celebration of the land with examining the damage being done to it? Was that just taking a look at what was already happening?
Darlene Naponse: It was on purpose. We wanted to tell the history of colonization, industrialization, and the effects that mining has had and will continue to have for the rest of our lives, because of what they’ve done to the land. That’s always a backdrop in all of my stories, because that’s what we live and that’s what we have to deal with every day. That is a constant. But I didn’t want it to be the story. I didn’t want it to take over the story. It was very purposeful to make sure that part of the story was told, but that it wasn’t the biggest part of the story. The biggest part of the story is the beauty of the land and the beauty of the people.
JG: This is your third TIFF feature, following Falls Around Her and Stellar. How do you see Aki as a continuation of your artistic journey, and in what ways does it feel like a departure?
Darlene Naponse: It really changed me as a filmmaker, and it really changed how I approach filmmaking, and it was just like a real joy making this. Filmmaking is such an amazing process, and it’s such a unique thing. You spend so much time with the people that you work with, you make relationships. So that’s really important to me. It’s not only what we see on screen, but it’s also how we do it and why we do it, right? Making films is such a wonder. I’m really grateful that I get to do that in my community and do it the way I want to do it through ceremony and with the community.
JG: Oh, for sure. I guess speaking to the community and the crew that you built, I wanted to talk a little bit about the score. It really adds such a haunting layer to the film. That was Cris Derkson, right? How did that collaboration come about?
Darlene Naponse: Luckily, she’s a friend. I got to meet her through some friends. I also had a piece of hers in Stellar. So I approached her and said, Can you do this? It was all original. It was so beautiful, and she’s such an incredible human being. She’s so talented. Just like what she does with these strings is just so amazing, and she tells those stories. She sees these images, and she just creates from that. And I love that. And you know what, it’s about making space for that in collaboration, for people to just be themselves and do what they do really well. And I think that’s what Cris does. It’s so beautiful.
JG: The film uses time-lapse, split screens, and underwater footage in really innovative ways. Can you talk about your visual language for this project and how you decided to experiment with these techniques?
Darlene Naponse: I love working with the cameramen that I was working with. They’re from Northern Ontario: Ryan Mariotti and Mathieu Seguin. Then most of the underwater stuff was my own. I was thinking about this yesterday, we used five different cameras on this film, and we talked constantly about how they’re all going to match and or not match. We even used some anamorphic lenses, at one point. Just having these beautiful cameras and lenses for us to play and to work with was really beautiful. I don’t know if I answered your question because I think I went on a tangent about how much fun we had and all the cameras. Can you tell I love the people I work with? They are so incredible.
JG: All good. I think that’s awesome. The community is clearly central to you and your work. How do you feel about the current state of Indigenous representation, both at TIFF but also in the larger Canadian entertainment world?
Darlene Naponse: I think it’s so strong. It’s really beautiful. Tonight we’re going to go see Tanya Talaga’s film Ni-Naadamaadiz: Red Power Rising. A few days earlier, I saw Gail Maurice’s Blood Lines. All of these filmmakers that are here have been working very long and very hard and telling their own stories. It’s so important and so powerful. Plus, I think with the funding from the Indigenous Screen Office and having Kelly Boutsalis on stage with us and working in programming at TIFF, that representation is really strong. It nurtures us as filmmakers to feel safe in these spaces. I look forward to seeing what’s going to come next.
JG: Lastly, Darlene, what’s next for you? What can people keep an eye out for?
Darlene Naponse: We are going to do an international co-production. It’s about cinema. It’s about missing and murdered Indigenous women and violence in cinema. We’re very excited to go somewhere new.
You can catch another screening of Aki at TIFF today, September 11th, at Scotiabank Theatre.
