FILM REVIEW: "In My Blood It Runs" is a powerful love letter to unheard Indigenous voices
In My Blood it Runs more than anything else, is an important film. The type of film that needs to be made, and that gently holds your hand and walks you through what it’s like to live in someone else’s shoes. It is a love letter to the indigenous population whose voices are not heard, and a powerful indictment of colonial Australia’s efforts to hijack a culture, a country, and a way of life. Put simply, once this film is over, people will see the plight of Indigenous Australians in a different light.
Directed by Maya Newell, In My Blood it Runs is a documentary that follows Dujuan, an intelligent and inquisitive young Aboriginal boy growing up in Alice Springs. His story is humble and understated. He cares for his family, he plays with his friends, and he feels an intrinsic connection to nature. His family tell him that he has special ‘healing powers’, which he uses frequently to nurse his loved ones. His mother worries about him the most because he has a “mind of his own” and often wanders around by himself.
Dujuan’s conflict arises when he begins to integrate into the local schooling system. He performs poorly and his grades reflect an inability to concentrate and apply himself. His teachers are subtly condescending towards Dujuan’s culture, mocking the ‘spirits’ that populate traditional indigenous literature. He is subjected to white-washed accounts of colonial Australia that run contrary to anything Dujuan has been taught by his own family. He begins to act out in rebellious ways and is punished accordingly. All of a sudden, the threat of juvenile detention looms heavy over the young boy’s head, who is told chilling horror stories about torture, food deprivation, and a general loss of freedom and innocence. He watches news reports of the Don Dale detention center footage, and squirms, uneasy at the sight of such grotesque behaviour from another human being.
It is no surprise that Dujuan does poorly in school. It’s not a reflection of his intelligence, neither is it a sign of him lashing out at the system. Dujuan is not malicious. He is not enraged. He is merely frustrated. Frustrated that he is being deprived of who he is, his own identity. And this is essentially what this film explores. The meaning and importance of identity. How identity can provide us with a sense of belonging, a sense of fulfillment, and how being deprived of one’s identity can lead to retaliation, alienation and a feeling of hopelessness. Dujuan’s descent into such a trajectory is never fully realised but the threat is never too far away.
Throughout the film, Newell’s roaming lens floats seamlessly between moments of bliss and anxiety, capturing a portrait of an indigenous family relishing in the joys of their own culture and the ever-present possibility of having it all taken away from them. The cinematography is gorgeous, capturing the desolate beauty of the desert along with the peaceful serenity of the bush and the creek the Dujuan frequents. The pacing is slow and subtle. It takes its time, savouring every moment of contented warmth and frazzled nerve as the family struggle desperately to keep young Dujuan from falling into the wrong crowd or being taken away by social services. The score lends the film a beating heart, with primal pulsing percussion frequently accompanied by sweeping strings that suggest both the significance of Dujuan’s ancestry as well as the emotional connection to his own journey and struggle.
With In My Blood It Runs, Maya Newell has made a vital statement about the plight of Indigenous Australians. Without exhausting the viewer or pushing any one political agenda too overtly, Newell has used the story of a young boy as a window into the realities of the difficulties young Indigenous people face growing up, and perhaps a way to resolve these difficulties as well.
