Nechako

Nechako is a crucial documentary from Lyana Patrick that follows two Indigenous Nations fighting for our collective future. When the Kenney Dam was built in the 1950s, it diverted 70 percent of the Nechako River into an artificial reservoir, severely impacting the lives of local Stellat’en and Saik’uz Nations. What followed were decades of resistance, including legal actions against the Canadian federal and provincial governments and Rio Tinto Alcan, a subsidiary of a global mining conglomerate.

Nechako follows the people fighting today to restore a river and a way of life: Nations going up against industry, community leaders advocating for their people, Elders documenting their histories and community members living off the land. An urgent call to action, Patrick’s film asks what survival looks like when it serves everyone, in a story 70 years in the making—a story of hope and resistance against all odds, amidst large-scale environmental destruction and despite the will of powerful institutions.