Shaman
2017 · 5m · Canada
Directed by Echo Henoche
Genres: animation, fantasy, historical
Tones: contemplative, dark, mythic
An Inuk shaman confronts a ferocious polar bear that threatens his community, using his powers to turn the animal to stone.
Picked by Margot
The scouts
Everyone's going to genuflect at the mythology and animation, but what actually interests me is how Henoche refuses the hero's triumph — the shaman doesn't vanquish, he petrifies, which is less victory than permanent paralysis, and that moral ambiguity is the only honest thing here.
This is a masterclass in animated formalism positioned squarely within Indigenous storytelling traditions and the NFB's own legacy of visual anthropology; Henoche's restraint with the camera and her commitment to mythic pacing over spectacle proves animation can be as rigorously composed as live-action cinema.
The decision to animate the bear's transformation into stone in real time — watching flesh calcify rather than cutting to the result — is the hinge the entire piece turns on; it's that single commitment to process over spectacle that makes a five-minute film about magic feel genuinely earned.