The Inheritors

October 2 screening with filmmaker Serge-Olivier Rondeau in attendance

Feature paired with short film KAUAʻI ʻŌʻŌ by Samy Benammar

As we stand at the brink of a sixth extinction caused by human activity, countless species are adapting swiftly, thriving in our shadow and foretelling the ecologies of the future. The Inheritors is guided by one such species, the ring-billed gull, in an exploration of our shared world. Each spring, tens of thousands of these gulls migrate to a small island in the Saint Lawrence River near Montreal to nest alongside Canada’s largest landfill, an essential source of food for their young. Tracing a full reproductive season, the film offers an arrestingly intimate observation of the colony’s social organization, emotional life and daily rituals in an increasingly inhospitable ecosystem. Alternating between the perspectives of prey and predator, we follow the gulls as they become the targets of invasive data collection, then of harsh deterrence measures using the age-old art of falconry. For these unwanted creatures, threats arrive from both land and air in the form of flesh, feather and metal. With a soundtrack that lets the voices of the birds speak for themselves and cinematography that prioritizes their gaze, The Inheritors is a sensory experience which invites us to contemplate new ways of living and dying on a planet haunted by mass consumption and pollution.