Director: Emily Kassie, Julian Brave NoiseCat
A documentary crew arrives at the Sugarcane Reserve in British Columbia to trace what happened at a nearby residential school, and the search turns into a community-wide reckoning that reaches back generations.
What is Sugarcane about?
Sugarcane follows the members of the Sugarcane Reserve as they open an investigation into St. Joseph's Mission, a former residential school where children were taken from Indigenous families under Canada's assimilation policies. As survivors and their descendants come forward, filmmakers Emily Kassie and Julian Brave NoiseCat (whose own family history is entwined with the school) piece together testimony, unmarked graves, and institutional records. The film moves between formal inquiry and intimate family scenes, following chief Willie Sellars and councillor Charlene Belleau as they push for accountability while raising children of their own on the same land where the abuses occurred.
Cast & crew
Julian Brave NoiseCat, credited as co-director, also appears on screen alongside his father Ed Archie Noisecat as the investigation intersects with his own family. Chief Willie Sellars and Charlene Belleau lead the community's search for records and remains, giving the film its throughline between institutional history and present-day leadership on the reserve.
Context & significance
Sugarcane was produced by teams in Canada and the United States and premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2024, where it won a directing award for documentary. It draws on years of reporting into residential schools operated jointly by the Canadian government and Catholic institutions through much of the twentieth century, a subject that has drawn wider public attention since the discovery of unmarked graves at former school sites across the country. The filmmakers were granted access to internal Vatican correspondence and local archives that had not previously been made public, which the film uses to trace decisions made far from the reserve itself.
Where & how to watch
Sugarcane streams on K-Time with Farsi subtitles and a Persian dub, so audiences can watch in their preferred language. The film's page is free to browse without an account; watching the film itself just needs a quick, free K-Time login, part of a Farsi-first viewing experience built for Persian-speaking audiences.