66 minutes / Color
Closed Captioned
Release: 2021
“Lost birds” – a term for Native children adopted out of their tribal communities. Right after the Indian Child Welfare Act of 1978 became the law of the land, Kendra Mylnechuk Potter was adopted into a white family and raised with no knowledge of her Native parentage. This beautiful and intimate film follows Kendra on her journey to find her birth mother April, also a Native adoptee, and return to her Lummi homelands in Washington State. With a sensitive yet unflinching lens, director Brooke Swaney (Blackfeet/Salish) documents Kendra and April as they connect with relatives and navigate what it means to be Native, and to belong to a tribe from the outside looking in. Along the way, Kendra uncovers generations of emotional and spiritual beauty and pain and comes to the startling realization that she is a living legacy of U. S. assimilationist policy. By sharing a deeply personal experience of inherited cultural trauma, the film opens the door to broader and more complicated conversations about the erasure of Native culture and questions of identity surrounding adoption.
"…Real, thoughtful, kind and provocative…"
Anselm Beach and Patricia Aufderheide IDA
"Captures an intense, personal search filled with kindness and love."
Darlene Naponse Hot Docs Film Festival
"This poignant story provides living proof that history is not only the past, but the present too."
Human Rights Watch Film Festival
"A courageous endeavor to understand oneself while allowing the camera to follow each trial and tribulation. The film is an exploration of sorrow and joy, and all of those confusing emotions in between."
Eric Moore AFI Docs
"A portrait of two courageous women -- mother and daughter - - who are willing to allow us into their remarkable journey to find each other and their heritage."
Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat Spirituality & Practice
"There’s a real sense of collaboration between Kendra and Swaney, and accountability on Swaney’s part to tell this story truthfully, which is refreshing to see in nonfiction filmmaking."
Orla Smith Seventh Row
"When Kendra Mylnechuk cold calls her birth mother...she is drawn, almost reluctantly, into an exploration of this history and of her own complex feelings of guilt, belonging, and loss. For the intimacy and depth of her portrayal of Kendra’s journey, the Emerging Filmmaker Award goes to Brooke Pepion Swaney."
Woodstock Film Festival
"An example of how intergenerational trauma continues."
Janet Fairbanks World Community Film Festival
"Emotionally resonate."
Human Rights Watch Film Festival
"An unsettling insight into the history of cultural genocide and it has caused the ‘lost generation’ and their children."
Find Others
"An impactful and intimate journey in discovering one’s identity...an important viewing."
Upcoming On Screen
"An extraordinary documentary."
Beth Barrett, Artistic Director Seattle International Film Festival
Swaney, Brooke Pepion (film producer)
Swaney, Brooke Pepion (film director)
Rafter, Jeri (film producer)
Potter, Kendra Mylnechuk (film producer)
Potter, Kendra Mylnechuk (on-screen participant)
Kowalski, April (on-screen participant)
Edited by Kristen Swanbek; composer, Laura Ortman; director of photography, Zelmira Gainza.
Selected Accolades
