Niigaanii-Animikii Inini Kalvin Hartwig in the Winnepeg recording studio.

An emotional movie premiere was held in Winnipeg on Thursday, Aug. 8, and a Washburn-based employee of the Red Cliff Tribe was happy to be in attendance.

The premiere was of the original 1977 Star Wars film, dubbed in the Ojibwe language – also known as Anishinaabemowin – by Ojibwe speakers in Canada and the United States, including Niigaanii-Animikii Inini Kalvin Hartwig, Language-Culture Coordinator for the Red Cliff Tribe, who was hired to voice Red Leader, played by the late actor Drewe Henley.

“Well, it all began when I was perusing Facebook after work, and I saw in one of my friend’s pages a posting calling for applications to audition for Ojibwe voice acting in the upcoming Star Wars: A New Hope (Anangong Miigaading), Ojibwe dub,” Hartwig said. “I’m very involved with Ojibwe language revitalization. I’m a filmmaker with experience in production and direction, looking to expand into voice acting and acting as well, and I’ve been a fan of Star Wars ever since I was a kid. So this was a no brainer to apply.”

The project was the result of a collaboration between the Dakota Ojibway Tribal Council, the University of Manitoba, Disney/Lucasfilm and APTN (the Winnipeg-based Aboriginal Peoples Television Network).

Producers chose Ojibwe because it’s the most spoken Indigenous language in much of Canada and Minnesota, with about 320,000 speakers. It’s the second time Star Wars has been officially translated into an Indigenous language, with the first being Navajo in 2013.

Hartwig applied and was accepted for a first audition. 

“Disney provided the script in Ojibwe and English, as well as clips of the film,” he said. “I had to give the recordings of me voicing lines for each of the characters I was auditioning for.”

He threw himself into the first audition by studying the emotions of the English-speaking characters.

“Then I did my best to pronounce each of the words in Ojibwe,” he said. “In my mind, I would think of the elders that I used to hear and how they said things. So that was my guiding light, those memories. I sent in the recordings, and they asked me for a second audition, this time live over Zoom with director Ellyn Stern and head of production, Shana Priesz.

During the second audition, Hartwig had just begun delivering lines when the director stopped him and offered some suggestions.

“I took the suggestions, and I reread the lines, and again, it wasn’t even maybe two, three sentences when she said, ‘OK I’ve heard enough. I’ve seen enough. I really like what you’re doing here. I’m going to give you a role.’ They offered me the role of Red Leader, which I gratefully accepted.”

He was given a date in May to do the recording in Winnipeg.

“I drove eight hours from Washburn to Winnipeg, and I went to the recording studio,“ Hartwig said. “There were two rooms, one small sound booth and the second next to it, where the audio team, as well as the director and a fluent first language elder (Dennis Chartrand, who voiced Darth Vader in the film) was there to listen in. The director offered guidance on emotion and intonation, and the Ojibwe elder was there for guidance, if necessary, for Ojibwe pronunciation.”

When we spoke, Hartwig was getting ready to drive to Winnipeg again to attend the international premiere.

“I am so excited to witness this historic milestone,” he said. “It’s an incredible, historical moment. It is the first Disney, if not major Hollywood, film dubbed in the Ojibwe language, and I hope the first of many to come, either produced or dubbed in the Ojibwe.”

Hartwig said the producers never really discussed the whys of the production, however, earlier in the year he had attended a conference where the keynote speaker was Pat Ningewance Nadeau, who was the lead translator of Star Wars: A New Hope (Anangong Miigaading). Her day job is as a professor at the University of Manitoba.

“In that keynote speech, she said that she had a dream of seeing Ojibwe communities being able to do anything we want, everyday things in the Ojibwe language, going shopping, going to school, watching Hollywood films in addition to our ceremonies, and I share in that vision,” Hartwig said. “So this is one small step on the way to making that dream a reality. Anything that we can do in English can be done in Ojibwe. Ojibwe is just as modern a language as any. I hope that this film inspires more people to begin learning or to continue learning Ojibwe.”

While Hartwig’s official work for the film is done, he now wants to build support for regional screenings of the Ojibwe-dubbed Star Wars.

“I just learned a few minutes ago that Duluth will get a screening, and I’m hoping to also get screenings in Ashland and elsewhere,” he said.

Stay tuned for those area screening dates.

The movie trailer and poster art can be viewed online at lucasfilm.app.box.com/s/rbx6bxcvs410151rwmkrizap2yhl42f0/folder/239735857440.

The Navajo version of Star Wars is already available for viewing on Disney-plus. The Ojibwe version will eventually join it there.

And, finally, it must be said:

“Gi-ga-miinigoowiz 

Mamaandaawiziwin.” 

(“May the force be with you.”)