ABOUT THE FILM

LOGLINE

Trapped in museum archives, Ancestors bend time and space to find their way home. History, spirituality, and the law collide as tribal repatriation specialists fight to return and rebury Indigenous human remains, offering a revealing look at the still-pervasive worldviews that justified collecting them in the first place.

LONG SYNOPSIS

AANIKOOBIJIGAN [ANCESTOR/GREAT-GRANDPARENT/GREAT-GRANDCHILD] documents the emotional and vital work of MACPRA (Michigan Anishinaabek Cultural Preservation and Repatriation Alliance). This alliance, made up of repatriation specialists representing all Michigan tribes, fights to bring their Ancestors and funerary objects home from settler colonial institutions like museums, libraries, and archives.

Adam and Zack Khalil’s monumental and formally daring film follows the pressing struggle to rebury Indigenous human remains that have been held in sterile storage, laying bare the history of Indigenous collections and the battle to recognize and enforce the laws intended to facilitate their repatriation to the communities they were originally stolen from. Using an essayistic approach alongside vérité portraits, the film celebrates the courageous individuals who carry out this hard and emotionally draining labor of return.

—Sundance Film Festival

Directors Adam Khalil, Zack Khalil

Producers Steve Holmgren, Adam Khalil, Zack Khalil, Grace Remington, Jacque Clark, Franny Alfano

Executive Producers Francene Blythe-Lewis, Carrie Lozano, Lois Vossen, Tiffany Sia, Ted Kennedy, Elizabeth Weatherford

Supervising Producer Michael Kinomoto

Associate Producer Nadia Rubalcava

Editors Adam Khalil, Zack Khalil

Cinematographers Zack Khalil, Adam Khalil, Jacque Clark, Shaandiin Tome, Sky Hopinka, Bayley Sweitzer, Christopher Yepez, Oresti Tsonopoulos, Samuli Haavisto, Noah Elliott Morrison

Sound Jacque Clark, Zack Khalil

Performers Alicia Gervais, Elizabeth Young, Jim Fletcher

FESTIVALS
2026: Sundance (World Premiere)

AWARDS
The Audience Award: NEXT (Sundance)

AVAILABLE TERRITORIES
The World

EXHIBITION FORMATS
DCP, Digital Download