Everyday Activist - KONELĪNE: our land beautiful

Posted on Wednesday, November 30, 2016 at 11:00 PM

Movie: Koneline: Our Land Beautiful

KONELINE: our land beautiful

Movie Review by Everyday Activist X CalgaryMovies.com

Winner at Banff Mountain Film Festival 2016: Best Mountain Environment and Natural History

Now that the main film festivals are over, I can start reviewing what I’ve watched from the Banff Mountain Film Festival 2016, hopefully before they come to Calgary on the Banff Mountain Film Festival World Tour 2016/17 #1 & #2. The dates have been announced and the tickets always sell out. However, Koneline will not be on the World Tour, but it is coming to the Globe Cinema from Friday December 2 to Sunday December 4th, 2016 and more than likely will screen at the Banff Center in spring with the other winners. Koneline presents a juxtaposition of competing interests in Canada’s north, whether it’s native culture, trophy hunting, mining or tourism.

Can everything co-exist in Northern B.C as it does in Southern B.C and Alberta with coal mining, local hunting and tourism? It’s an interesting question. As a chemist, I know the toxicity of gold mining and the potential threats to the head waters in just chemical threats forget erosion, soil damage and wildlife disruption. In addition the government doesn’t do a good job of making sure that companies have enough funds to clean up the messes they make. Look a bit further north to Yellowknife to see the mistakes made at the Giant Gold Mine that taxpayers still have to pay for, forever. Last year in Whitehorse, I attended the Peel Appeal, which tackles the same issues.

The documentary does a good job of staying pretty neutral to the competing interests. Natives are always under represented so I enjoyed learning about the dying dialects and the work to preserve them. In Calgary, at the library this summer, I went to a couple lectures featuring Richard Van Camp where he talked about native people who have compiled dictionaries to help future generations preserve their heritage. I did catch the reference at the end of Koneline to the legendary Iditarod racing family, the Mackey’s, when a Taultan man called one of his sled dogs, Mackey. If this sounds familiar to you, the movie "The Great Alone", about Lance Mackey, won the Grand Prize in Banff last year and was also featured at the Calgary International Film Festival.

One of the best features of Koneline was the cinematography. It’ll never do the north justice with the northern lights and rugged landscapes, as compared to an actual visit, but it comes close. Even the miners seemed to understand what a special place they had come to explore. Quiet places to rest, relax and rejuvenate are scarce and until we value them as much as minerals we’ll constantly be in conflict with different interests all wanting a stake claim to the riches of the north.

Again you can catch Koneline at the Globe Cinema on Friday December 2 to Sunday December 4th, 2016 at 7:00 pm. If you miss it there, I’m sure it will screen again in Banff during the spring. 

Calgary Showtimes: Koneline: Our Land Beautiful >