National Geographic has a reputation for excellence; no wonder that film critics around the world unquestioningly accept the blood libel put forward in their documentary Sugarcane. Film critics love it so much that they awarded it “Best Political Documentary” and “Best True Crime Documentary” at the Critics’ Choice Documentary Awards in New York in November.
Except, of course, that there was no crime – but it is highly political. The film claims that priests and nuns committed atrocities to hapless Indigenous children at St Joseph’s Indian Residential School in British Columbia. These include impregnating female students and disposing of the unwanted babies in the school’s incinerator.
