from Award-Winning Documentarian Tasha Hubbard,

to have Canadian Premiere at the

2024 Hot Docs Film Festival in the Land|Sky|Sea Programme

Instagram: @singingbackthebuffalo_film

Available for interviews: Writer/director Tasha Hubbard
Screening link available upon request.
Press materials available: https://buffalosong.com/

Hot Docs Screenings:

April 26, 2024 5:30 PM Tiff Lightbox 1
April 29, 2024 12:00 PM Tiff Lightbox 3

Edmonton. March 26, 2024. Singing Back the Buffalo the new feature length documentary from award-winning Cree filmmaker Tasha Hubbard (nîpawistamâsowin: We Will Stand Up, Birth of a Family) will have its Canadian premiere at the 2024 Hot Docs Film Festival in the Land|Sky|Sea programme which showcases films about our relationship to our environment. The film is eligible for the Award for Best Environmental Documentary and the Audience Award.

Richly visualised and deeply uplifting, Singing Back the Buffalo is an epic reimagining of North America through the lens of buffalo consciousness and a potent dream of what is within our grasp, which follows Indigenous visionaries and communities who are rematriating the buffalo to the lands they once defined.

Singing Back the Buffalo is written and directed by Hubbard and produced by Hubbard, Jason Ryle (Amplify), George Hupka (nîpawistamâsowin: We Will Stand Up, Obmin, On the Edge), associate produced by Marie-Eve Marchand (Iniskim), and executive produced by Bonnie Thompson (The Secret Society, nîpawistamâsowin: We Will Stand Up). A one-hour version will be broadcast on CBC The Nature of Things, feature version on APTN later in 2025. Canadian distribution is handled by Cinema Politica.

Hubbard (Cree) is an award-winning filmmaker, a buffalo academic and buffalo activist. Together with Blackfoot Elder Leroy Little Bear, Hubbard weaves an intimate story of humanity’s connections to buffalo and meticulously reveals how their return to the Great Plains can indeed usher in a new era of sustainability and balance. On her journey spanning eight years, Hubbard explores the challenges faced by buffalo allies and shares the positive steps already taken towards the ultimate - but uncertain - goal of buffalo rematriation. After their dark recent history of almost extinction, and in this time of immense environmental degradation and global uncertainty, the buffalo can lead us to a better tomorrow.

“Buffalo have long been a bright light in my life,” said Tasha Hubbard, “holding me up as I made challenging films and deepened my connection to my Indigenous community. Singing Back the Buffalo at Hot Docs, in this program, is deeply significant to me. This film leans into beauty, hope, and Indigenous agency, as well as the incredible power of the buffalo to create much needed recovery.”

Singing Back the Buffalo is produced in association with CBC and APTN and produced with the participation of the Canada Media Fund, the Indigenous Screen Office and Telefilm Canada, with the assistance of the Government of Alberta, the participation of the Canadian Film or Video Production Tax Credit and Rogers Documentary Fund, as well as fiscal sponsorship provided by Redford Center.

Download the March 26.2024 Press Release: pdf here.

Media Contact:

Cynthia Amsden, Roundstone Communication 416.910.7740 cynthia@roundstonepr.com

Jade Tootoosis, jtootoosis@buffalorelations.land 

Buffalo Eye. Photo credit: George Hupka

About the team

  • Dr. Tasha Hubbard

    Writer/Director/Producer: Dr. Tasha Hubbard is a filmmaker and an associate professor in the Faculty of Native Studies at the University of Alberta. She is from Peepeekisis First Nation in Treaty Four Territory and has ties to Thunderchild First Nation in Treaty Six Territory. She is also the mother of a fifteen-year-old son. Her academic research is on Indigenous efforts to return the buffalo to the lands and Indigenous film in North America. She has been working to support the Buffalo Treaty since 2015, and is one of the founding directors of the International Buffalo Relations Institute. Her first solo writing/directing project Two Worlds Colliding, about Saskatoon’s infamous Starlight Tours, premiered at ImagineNATIVE in 2004 and won the Canada Award at the Gemini Awards in 2005. In 2016, she directed an NFB-produced feature documentary called Birth of a Family about a 60s Scoop family coming together for the first time during a holiday in Banff. It premiered at Hot Docs International Film Festival and landed in the top ten audience choice list. It also won the Audience Favourite for Feature Documentary at the Edmonton International Film Festival and the Moon Jury prize at ImagineNATIVE. Her last film was nîpawistamâsowin: We Will Stand Up, an exploration of the impact of the death of Colten Boushie that premiered in the spring of 2019. It opened the Hot Docs International Film Festival and won the top Canadian documentary prize. It also won the Colin Low Award for the top Canadian film at the DOXA International Film Festival and the Canadian Screen Award for Best Feature Documentary. Hubbard was awarded the DGC Discovery award in 2019.

  • Jason Ryle

    Producer: Jason Ryle, Producer: Jason Ryle is a producer, programmer, curator, story editor, and arts consultant based in Toronto. Through his mother, he is Anishinaabe and a member of Lake St. Martin First Nation, Manitoba. Jason was the Executive Director of imagineNATIVE from July 2010 to June 2020. In addition to SINGING BACK THE BUFFALO, Jason has produced the docuseries AMPLIFY for APTN and several award-winning shorts. In February 2021, Jason received the Clyde Gilmour Award from the Toronto Film Critics Association. The award is bestowed to Canadians whose work has in some way enriched the understanding and appreciation of film in their native country. Jason is also the International Programmer, Indigenous Cinema for TIFF.

  • Bonnie Thompson

    Executive Producer: Bonnie is a veteran and independent Canadian media producer of documentary, animation, and interactive projects. She worked as a producer with the National Film Board of Canada for many years, and now works independently. Her productions have been screened by national and international broadcasters and streamers (CBC, The Doc Channel, SuperChannel, APTN, PBS, NHK, Netflix, Apple), in festivals around the world (TIFF, Hot Docs, IDFA, Berlin, Sundance, Annecy) and on the web, with numerous awards and nominations, including Canadian Screen nominations and awards, an Oscar and Emmy nomination, and Webby awards.

  • George Hupka

    DOP, Producer: George has worked with Tasha for over 25 years. They formed Downstream Documentary Productions to make Nîpawistamâsowin, and continue to bring Indigenous stories to the screen. As a cinematographer, Hupka has shot projects around the world for the UK’s Windfall Films, documentary features and shorts for the National Film Board, and many award-winning projects for CBC, CTV, and TSN. He directed and produced Obmin, a documentary about the Soviet Union before the fall of the Berlin Wall as seen through the eyes of Canadian exchange students, and was the producer and DP of the Rogers series On the Edge. His short film about photographer and artist Lesia Maruschak, The Diggers, was recently screened at Landskrona Foto Festival in Sweden.

  • Marie-Eve Marchand

    Associate Producer/Production Manager: Marie-Eve is the Executive Director of the International Buffalo Relations Institute supporting the implementation of the Buffalo Treaty with over forty indigenous communities in the Great Plains of North America and she is Business Manager and Strategy for the UICN WCPA Beyond the Aichi Task Force working globally on setting global goals for people, nature and climate. She successfully coordinated the movement to bring the plains bison back to Banff National Park and received the Golden Leaf National Award for her conservation work in Quebec.

  • Hans Olson

    Editor : Hans Olson edited two of Tasha Hubbard's previous documentaries – nîpawistamâsowin: We Will Stand Up (2020 Canadian Screen Award for Best Feature Documentary) and Birth of a Family. Other recent editing work includes Arab Women Say What?! by Nisreen Baker and Kímmapiiyipitssini: The Meaning of Empathy by Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers. Hans studied screenwriting at Langara College and is an alumnus of the Canadian Film Centre and Berlinale Talents.