Woman Dress Film Click Here To View

SO my film is finally available on the NFB website! You can click the link text just above this image to watch it! I’m super stoked about it. It’s been a lot of work, a lot of thought went into it. I wanted to tell a story that has been passed down through generations in my family. And it’s hard to make a doc about someone who is long gone. But the NFB was really amazing at helping me achieve my vision. And I just have so many people to thank, like my Auntie Beth, who first told me this story when I was looking for an old story about a two spirit person. And my collaborators, Kiley May our amazing actress who embodied this role so perfectly. And Maria Todorov-Topouzov, our incredible editor who went above and beyond to make this piece so amazing. And Gabriela Osio Vanden who was such a great Director of Photography and who worked really well with Maria on the green screen. And of course my producer Justine Pimlott who was willing to let me push what a doc can be. ALSO special thanks to Southern Thunderbird/Humming bird Calling Women’s Drums, a traditional Women’s Big Drum Group, for providing music. AND OH MY GOD also mega thanks to my cousin Sage Paul for creating the dress for us. All of these women were so incredible to work with and so happy to see this film come to life.

I’m also really thankful to my Grandpa, Stan Cuthand, who has passed on but who left us with an amazing legacy of traditional stories from his parents and their parents and so on. I don’t really know when Woman Dress lived on the Plains, but we think it was before contact.

It was really important for me to make this film because there have been Indigenous people who try to say that two spirit people were not really accepted the way we say we were. And I’m sure every tribe is different. But I know from this story at least that there was a two spirit person who traveled around the plains and was welcomed and accepted and honoured by the tribes and communities they traded stories with. I would love to know more about this person, but I’m not sure how much exists. Even my Grandfather was reluctant to tell this story when my Auntie wanted to make a book out of it.

I’m really happy I got to make this film and it’s definitely one of my favourite works I’ve ever done.