October 21, 2026
FORGOTTEN WARRIORS IS A DOCUMENTARY FILM made in 1997 by Loretta Todd, “one of the first Indigenous women to pursue film studies at Vancouver’s Simon Fraser University,” for the National Film Board (NFB).
On National Indigenous Veterans Day (Sunday, November 8, 2026) or anytime, you can honour the thousands of Indigenous veterans who deployed for major global conflicts and peacekeeping missions by viewing the 51-minute film online.
Indigenous Veterans Day was first commemorated in 1994 in Winnipeg, with the rest of Canada following shortly after. It occurs every year three days in advance of Remembrance Day (November 11).
From the NFB’s Forgotten Warriors web page:
This documentary introduces us to thousands of Indigenous Canadians who enlisted and fought alongside their countrymen and women during World War II, even though they could not be conscripted. Ironically, while they fought for the freedom of others, they were being denied equality in their own country and returned home to find their land seized.
Loretta Todd’s poignant film offers forth the testimony of those who were there, and how they managed to heal.
In addition to directing numerous award-winning films from 1991 to 2023, Loretta Todd “has also created video installations for Vancouver’s Museum of Anthropology and other gallery venues. The recipient of a Rockefeller Fellowship and a former participant in the Sundance Institute’s Scriptwriters Lab, Todd has received lifetime achievement awards from imagineNATIVE and the Taos Talking Pictures Festival.”
See her more recent and extensive bio here.
See the NFB Mini-Lesson for Forgotten Warriors for classroom and other discussion.
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We acknowledge that the land on which we work is the unceded territory of the Coast Salish peoples, including the territories of the xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations.