The Secret Path

Chanie Wenjack was born on January 19, 1954. This Friday would have been his 70th birthday.

In 1966, Chanie Wenjack ran away from Cecilia Jeffrey Residential School in Kenora, Ontario. He walked for 36 hours along the train tracks before dying of exposure on October 22. He was just 12 years old.

Fifty years later, Tragically Hip frontman Gord Downie took Wenjack's story and turned it into the Secret Path project, including a solo album, a graphic novel and an animated film.

The Secret Path is an animated film adaptation of Gord Downie's album and Jeff Lemire's graphic novel. Working with Downie's poetry and music, Lemire created a powerful visual representation of the life of Chanie Wenjack. The film is divided into ten chapters, each a song from Downie's musical retelling of Chanie's story – from his escape from the Cecilia Jeffrey Indian Residential School, to his subsequent and heartbreaking death from hunger and exposure to the harsh weather. The final product is a uniquely immersive emotional experience - an insight into the life of a little boy who, as Gord has said, he never knew, "but will always love."