3rd largest Native film festival

Aboriginal film festival third-largest on continent

By Alison MayesWAFF--which opened Wednesday and runs to Sunday--is packed with guests, educational events and more than 40 new indigenous films (about 10 features and more than 30 shorts) from Canada and the world.

Screenings take place at the University of Winnipeg's Eckhardt-Gramatté Hall and Cinematheque. The gathering is the third-largest showcase of aboriginal cinema in North America, Rajotte says, after Toronto's ImagineNATIVE and the San Francisco fest.

Attendance doubled last year, leaping from about 1,500 in 2008 to 3,000.

High-profile features in the 2010 lineup include Two Indians Talking, a comedy/drama about two First Nations men as they prepare to erect a blockade (stars Nathaniel Arcand and Justin Rain will attend the screening Saturday) and La Mission, a drama about a macho Mexican-American (Benjamin Bratt) who finds out that his son is gay (supporting actor Patrick Shining Elk will attend Friday).Comment:  For more on Native film festivals, see 7th Annual Red Nation Film Festival and AIM's First Film Festival.