Final Rating: 3/5
I can remember learning about manifest destiny in 8th grade: an unyielding march across America, killing and enslaving any indigenous peoples that got in the way. It wasn’t taught as such an inhumane thing 20 years ago. But the truth is colonizers typically aren’t happy to coexist with the people they find inhabiting the land they plan to live on. Shortly after the formation of the Dominion of Canada in 1867, America’s northern neighbor was also deciding how to treat the hosts of their land. For a while, the hope was to teach indigenous peoples of Canada to be part of Euro-Canadian society.
Something I was not taught in school was a policy known colloquially as the “Sixties Scoop”, when, in the late 1950s and early 1960s, tens of thousands of children were taken from their native land and redistributed to foster families. Rather than attempt to coexist with indigenous peoples, the plan was to forcibly assimilate them while eradicating their native culture. This history is not fully explained in Tasha Hubbard’s Meadowlarks, but it’s important to provide context for the film’s sibling reunion half a century after they were taken from their homes.
Five siblings were split up and sent to live with five different families. George is the only one who doesn’t show up to the reunion. Connie, Carmen Moore, rents out the house where everyone is staying. Gwen, a bristly Michelle Thrush, comes across as the sibling who least wants to be there and harbors the most pain of the four in attendance. Anthony, a tepid Michael Greyeyes, is the quiet big brother pushing his emotions down as much as possible. And Marianne, a best-in-show Alex Rice, was the only one sent overseas, growing up in Antwerp, Belgium.
The film has very little narrative propulsion. It’s an hour and a half of four strangers trying to understand each other. Some come from homes with foster siblings, but this is an opportunity for them to get to know their flesh and blood family. The title, Meadowlarks, comes from the last name of their parents: Wasepescan, a name that Connie has embroidered on the back of hockey jerseys that she gifts to everyone on their first night together.
Each of the four has their own journey and the film does a really good job of focusing on moments for each as individuals and for different pairs of the siblings. Anthony shares indigenous music with Marianne. Marianne helps Connie confront her fear of heights. Connie talks about her stuffed koala Kiki and how she was the only one of the group to meet their mother before she passed, an event that partially triggers this reunion.
The acting, at times, comes across somewhat stilted, almost as if the actors are as unsure of their characters as their characters are of the reunion they’re attending. Michael Greyeyes, in particular, doesn’t seem to come into his own as Anthony until almost an hour into the film when he shares a vulnerable moment with Marianne about what it means to be a big brother to three women he hasn’t seen in fifty years.
However, the core of Meadowlarks hits on something quite profound. The key scene of the film revolves around a smudging ceremony. In turn, each person in attendance allows smoke to wash over and cleanse them. After this, a young boy sings an honor song, like the music Anthony shared with Marianne. Part chant, part yell, this honor song to the uninitiated (including this writer) may sound incoherent.
As everyone responds to the boy’s singing, there’s a mixture of connection and discomfort from Anthony, Connie, Gwen, and Marriane. They know that this is something that should be part of their lives and yet, it is frustratingly foreign to them. Something right in front of their eyes offers a window into a life they never had and a culture they were taken away from. How bittersweet it must be to experience something so intensely connected to a culture that you are unfamiliar with, but should have been part of.
There’s no fixing the “Sixties Scoop”. Some of them probably didn’t have siblings or family to reunite with at all. That these four have that available to them is a blessing. The greatest strength of Meadowlarks is Tasha Hubbard’s direction and the screenplay she wrote with Emil Sher. The cast doesn’t always feel completely in tune with what’s going on around them, but the story is so powerful that it doesn’t need them to be for it to be effective.
Thank you to Mongrel Media and Star PR for the screener.
