Telefilm Canada's Letterboxd dropped a like on my 13th Canadian Screen Awards list today, so I couldn't think of a better reason to get back into watching some more nominees. Naturally I decided to watch one of Telefilm Canada's, Seeds.

Canadian icon Kaniehtiio Horn (many probably know her as Tanis from Letterkenny) got herself personally triple nominated with best lead, best original screenplay, and best first feature. The last nomination of four for Seeds would be a Graham Greene nomination in ing, even though his role is ultimately just a cameo where he plays well, himself.

Kaniehtiio unfortunately does face some steep competition in all three of her categories, most notably front runner Universal Language in lead and screenplay, whereas the other first features are in the best picture running.

Awards aside though, Kaniehtiio Horn has created something wholly unique. Seeds is an infused water blend of social media, Indigenous history, socially conscious topics, comedy, and straight up torture horror that all together is nothing if not impressive as a debut. A distinct voice shines through, and her performance when the horror kicks in, is straight up frightening; she was not joking about bringing out the anger of her ancestors.

Seeds is also educational though, at least to me, about the monopolizing of seeds. It honestly comes as no surprise to look it up afterwards and see a few companies owning all of it. The film is another reminder about the contrast of the way of life of the Indigenous people versus the capitalism of colonizers. They preserved and shared, whereas capitalism destroys and steals. Even though Kaniehtiio is scary in those final moments, we are all on her side.

Unfortunately though, the conclusion ends up feeling only like a small personal victory for Kaniehtiio's character, despite the clever callbacks to the beginning. And that's the sad truth. That the small victories is sometimes all we get in the face of evil companies and capitalism. But at the very least, Kaniehtiio's character in the end stayed true to herself and her people.