Film phase:Production
SYNOPSIS
When They Were Here is a documentary about the missing and murdered indigenous women, and girls crisis within the Blackfeet Reservation in the state of Montana. The film is told through the memories and lives of those that are left behind by the crisis: families. Three stories intersect through time, place, and memory–creating a shared experience of the crisis that examines the legacy of violence of the place they call home..
When They Were Here is a 2022 (Egg)celerator Lab Finalist.
ABOUT THE DIRECTOR
Ivy MacDonald is an Emmy® Award winning Blackfeet filmmaker based in Montana. As an enrolled member of the Blackfeet Tribe, most of her work has focused on her community. The most recent project she produced, Blackfeet Boxing: Not Invisible, won an Emmy® at the 2021 Sports Emmy® Awards. Her first feature length directorial project When They Were Here is in production and has received support from ITVS, Firelight Media, and Chicken & Egg Pictures.
ABOUT THE CO-DIRECTOR
Ivan MacDonald is an Emmy® Award winning Blackfeet filmmaker based in Montana. As an enrolled member of the Blackfeet Tribe, most of his work has focused on his community. The most recent project he produced, Blackfeet Boxing: Not Invisible, won an Emmy® at the 2021 Sports Emmy® Awards. His first feature length directorial project When They Were Here is in production and has received support from ITVS, Firelight Media, and Chicken & Egg Pictures.
ABOUT THE PRODUCER
Jessica Jane Hart is a Montana native who studied photography at Northwest College in Powell, Wyoming. After graduating in 2006, she moved to Munich, Germany to work as a freelance assistant to photographers Elias Hassos, Anja Frers, and Matthias Ziegler. In 2009, she returned to the US and has been working as a freelance photographer in Montana, New York, and California. In 2013, she began to work on her first documentary film project, Makoshika, which was completed in 2015.