Fractured Land follows the courageous journey of a modern Indigenous warrior to preserve his people’s land and culture from the forces of neocolonialism in Canada.
Caleb Behn is a young, indigenous warrior fighting to save his people’s land and culture. Deep in the exquisite wilderness of northeastern British Columbia, where Caleb’s people live, the multi-billion-dollar oil and gas industry spills chemicals into the environment – chemicals linked to cancer and birth defects, and to the killing of brain and blood cells. Caleb himself was born with a birth defect and spent long, painful years under the surgeons’ knives, face cut, lips sewn together.
Preparing for battle, Caleb finishes law school. Filmmakers Fiona Rayher and Damien Gillis follow him to New Zealand, where he learns from the Maori, teaches them what he has learned from his experiences, and discusses common strategies. Both cultures have fought against the ravages of the energy industry, and are raising new young leaders. They are forming alliances, using traditional knowledge and the modern weapon of the law.
Fractured Land is the story of a man whose simple wish to teach his future children how to hunt in his traditional lands has forced him into battle. He is gentle and soft-spoken, yet he is an expert with several deadly weapons and sports a Mohawk. He understands other people the way great political leaders understand. Meeting him, you feel his charisma, his intelligence, and a sense of fate, as if meeting a young Gandhi or Lech Walesa.