‘Sugarcane’ documentary spotlights Indigenous resilience amid dark residential school history [Video]

HOUSTON, Texas — The award-winning documentary “Sugarcane” is coming to Hulu and Disney+ and tells the horrific history of Indigenous residential schools and the lasting impacts it’s left on survivors, their families, and the community.

Filmed mostly in Sugarcane, British Columbia, on the Williams Lake Indian Reserve, Julian Brave NoiseCat traces the disturbing history of residential schools that removed thousands of Indigenous children from their families, placing them in government-sanctioned schools, which aimed to strip them of their culture and assimilate them into Western society.

“This is one of the foundational stories of North America,” NoiseCat told ABC 13. “This is what happened to First peoples.”

The issue is close to NoiseCat, who is a member of the Canim Lake Band Tsq’escen and a descendant of the Lil’Wat Nation of Mount Currie.