Formline is the defining visual language of traditional Northwest Coast First Nations art, continuous, curvilinear shapes that swell, diminish, and never meet at a hard edge. FORMLINE traces the unexpected kinship between this ancient art form and the physics of big mountain snowboarding, where reading terrain and carving a line demand the same fluidity, restraint, and trust in the material at hand.

The film is anchored by two women charting their own course. Kari Morgan (K'alaajex), a Nisga'a sculptor, painter, and snowboarder, became the first woman to receive a blessing ceremony to begin carving a totem pole in her community, breaking from a practice traditionally reserved for men. Christine Berube-Martin, a Mi'kmaq professional snowboarder and nurse, spent years feeling severed from her culture after losing her mother young; it was backcountry riding in the Yukon that gave her a way back to herself, and to her roots.

Set against the Coast Mountains in winter, Formline weaves carving and riding into a single visual and emotional throughline, two women, two crafts, one shared pursuit of flow, identity, and belonging.

Canada