It’s 1976 on the Red Crow Mi’kmaq reserve, and 15-year-old Aila (Jacobs) is the weed princess of her community. Hustling drugs with her uncle Burner, she sells enough dope to pay a “truancy tax” to Popper, the sadistic “Indian agent” who runs St. Dymphna’s Residential School.
It’s a tough life, but she’s making it work. That is, until the precarious balance of her world is threatened by her father’s return from prison, and the theft of her drug money.
Part fable, part small-town drama, Rhymes for Young Ghouls is a richly imaginative and striking drama about growing up during a very dark time in Canada’s treatment of Indigenous people.
“A savvy [Indigenous] genre film with a strong, beautiful and ingenious heroine whose courage helps right an injustice.” — Liam Lacey, The Globe and Mail
"An intense and unapologetic film about residential school like no other, this film is sure to change the way you think about Canadian-Indigenous relations both past and present. Required viewing for all Canadians (who can stomach it)." —Melissa
Jeff Barnaby
Jeff Barnaby
Justine Whyte, Aisling Chin-Yee, John Christou
Glen Gould, Brandon Oakes, Devery Jacobs, Roseanne Supernault
Drama, Sci-Fi/Fantasy
English
English, French
English
Rhymes for Young Ghouls is filmed and set in Quebec. Jeff Barnaby is from Ontario.