Tyra Delver brings bannock to the big screen
Tyra Delver grew up on Saddle Lake First Nation watching her mom make bannock. Back then, she was merely an observer, sharing space while her mom did the work. It wasn’t until years later, when she found herself adding water to a bannock-making kit, that she realized how important the simple food is to so many people’s lives.
“As I was making and eating that bannock, I was thinking about how it sustains families – that even though it’s not historically an Indigenous food, so many people have claimed it as their own.”
The idea of connecting bannock – which has evolved into a symbol of Indigenous resilience – to food sovereignty and using it as a generational storytelling tool first came to Delver, a Bachelor of Design student, while brainstorming for a class project. That particular project wasn’t the right fit, but it firmly rooted the idea in her mind. She tried to reinvigorate it with a MacEwan grant, but the scope was too big. Then, in the Fall of 2025, an opportunity with the National Film Board (NFB) found its way into her feed.
“I want people to see themselves in this film and for it to open doors for more Indigenous people to have these kinds of opportunities. I didn’t think a little Rez girl like me could do something like this. It’s hard to have confidence in yourself as an emerging filmmaker – to believe you have stories to tell and a vision to share. But I’m here, and I’m making my younger self very proud.”
Students like design student Tyra Delver do great things, including being selected to partner with the National Film Board to create "pâkwêsikan sâkihtin: Bannock Is Love," which will premiere at the Toronto Film Festival in September.
The NFB’s {RE}DEFINED project was seeking five storytellers to explore what it means to be Canadian or Indigenous today. Receiving the email that she had been selected from more than 240 applicants to bring her idea to life set off a whirlwind of activity: a trip to Toronto for a week of training, meeting with her producers, filming during Reading Week in March and more filming throughout May.
Each of the four stories in Delver’s 10-minute film, pâkwêsikan sâkihtin: Bannock Is Love, will feature a different generation sharing stories while covering a step in the bannock-making process. The final product, explains Delver, will piece together those steps into a tutorial that she hopes will tell an important and relatable story.
“I want people to see themselves in this film and for it to open doors for more Indigenous people to have these kinds of opportunities,” she says. “I didn’t think a little Rez girl like me could do something like this. It’s hard to have confidence in yourself as an emerging filmmaker – to believe you have stories to tell and a vision to share. But I’m here, and I’m making my younger self very proud.”
Delver will be busy over the coming weeks as she works with her NFB film crew on the final push to have the film ready for July when the Toronto International Film Festival announces its lineup.
