The Road

The Road is an award-winning short film starring the Indigenous girls of Stardale Women's Group. It explores various themes pertaining to the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls and the legacy and inter-generational impact of colonialism in Canada.

Your rental of The Road goes towards increased social and wellness programming, basic needs, and better lives for many Indigenous young women and girls, their families and their communities in Calgary, Alberta.

Stardale Women’s Group

Stardale Women’s Group has been building momentum in the area of social justice and inclusion, as well as delivering services pertaining to the Missing and Murdered Women and Girls for a long time. In response to the Reclaiming Power and Place report, Stardale Women’s Group created The Road, as it relates to the many women and girls who have gone missing on the Yellowhead Highway or what is known as the “Trail of Tears”. The Road will allow for healing to take place through arts and culture, while acknowledging our women and girls are sacred. 

As a grassroots charity, Stardale Women’s Group addresses complex issues that affect urban Indigenous girls through a cultural lens. Upon carefully defining the needs of the girls within the community, we seek unique and creative ways to meet them, thus implementing preventative practices that respond to those unmet needs. The Road that takes a holistic view of storytelling through a performance creation and a video documentary. The approach endeavored to interconnect urban girls from Stardale Women’s Group programming to women who have lived experiences, which they will share with the girls to assist the girls in co-creating a production that will educate and inform audiences on the interpretations and reflections of violence and trauma.

The narratives which the girls describe have built upon the resiliency of each group member.  A cultural mirror was developed as the girls explored and created a piece that may be used as a methodology to heal themselves, through interpretative art. The story telling designs included the “two world-views” (Indigenous and non-Indigenous) with the concept of translating the performance productions for a variety of audiences. This genre of cultural diversity is developing at an accelerated rate, and reflects the growing need in our society for communication and reconciliation.