Blood Quantum
On the outskirts of the fictional reserve of Red Crow, the dead are suddenly coming back to life. While Indigenous People seem immune to the epidemic, they must deal with a wave of White refugees seeking shelter. When, in the early 2010s, Mi’kmaq director Jeff Barnaby started working on this scenario, he was far from imagining that his film Blood Quantum would be a highly topical matter upon its release scheduled in March 2020. If it respects the codes of the classic horror film genre, behind the pure entertainment Blood Quantum also infuses a historical subtext that invites audiences to question Canada’s tumultuous relationship with Indigenous Peoples since colonization. From a response to pandemics – past, present and future –, Blood Quantum has become a powerful historical metaphor coupled with a more global environmental and social critique whose shock waves, in the current context, can reach everyone.