Slash/Back
Representation matters in this sci-fi/horror-comedy that serves as a calling card for its native filmmaker.
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There’s much to admire about co-writer/producer/director Nyla Innuksuk’s debut feature “Slash/Back” (available in select theaters and on VOD beginning Friday, Oct. 21 before debuting on Shudder in the coming months). Innuksuk, a native of the Canadian Inuit village Pangnirtung, Nunavut located on Baffin Island in the Arctic Ocean, has made a genre movie set in Pang that should empower young women of all walks of life.
It’s summertime in Pang and there’s sunlight 24-7. Ringleader Maika (Tasiana Shirley), the scrappy Uki (Nalajoss Elsworth), the poshly prissy Leena (Chelsea Prusky) and horrorhead Jesse (Alexis Wolfe) are teenage girls who spend their days bicycling around the hamlet. All of them avoid hanging out with Maika’s little sister Aju (Frankie Vincent-Wolfe). Some of them are pining for golden boy Thomassie (Rory Anawak). Most of them want out of Pang, save for Uki, who thinks their village is actually pretty cool.
On the day of Pang’s annual Square Dance during which all of the village’s adults are preoccupied, the girls want nothing more than to attend a party at Thomassie’s house. Throwing a wrench into their plans is an alien invasion from creatures referred to as Skins, parasitic beings who inhabit the bodies of animals and humans alike. Maika must embrace the hunting techniques taught by her father, which she’s largely turned her back on, in order to save Pang.
“Slash/Back” plays out like John Carpenter’s “The Thing” (Jesse references it directly) meets “Now and Then” meets “Attack the Block” with an indigenous spin. Sometimes the writing and acting are a bit cheesy (line writings and readings can come across like a “Peanuts” special), but its cheesiness often makes the proceedings all the more endearing.
The movie’s tech specs certainly impress. The music by Michael Brook (“Brooklyn”) and Nunavut DJs the Halluci Nation is appropriately rousing. Guy Godfree’s cinematography is greatly aided by the natural beauty of Baffin Island. Editor Simone Smith cuts a “gear up” montage that would surely make Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone smile. The prosthetics and special effects makeups overseen by Steve Newburn and Erin Sweeney respectively and visual effects from Mavericks VFX lend the proceedings spectacle on what surely must’ve been a shoestring budget.
It’s true that a rising tide lifts all boats, this is especially important after the recent loss of native genre filmmaker Jeff Barnaby (“Blood Quantum”). Innuksuk’s debut is shaky in spots, but undeniably promising. (She slyly inserts political commentary by having the back of Maika’s leather jacket read, “No justice on stolen land.” Some liberal’s heads will likely spin since these teenage girls brandish rifles and Inuit blades. What’s more important: cultural representation and girl power or keeping guns out the hands of kids?) “Slash/Back” offers representation to those without much media representation – this is important and announces Innuksuk as an exciting new cinematic voice.