Endless Cookie

“The goal is to make something funny, beautiful, spiritual, political, complex, simple, and true. That should be easy, right?” So declares Seth Scriver at the beginning of this colorful, digressive, and endlessly entertaining animated documentary. But define “easy.” Canadian arts grant secured, co-director Seth travels from Toronto to remote Shamattawa, Manitoba, to document his Indigenous half-brother Pete’s beguiling stories. But since Pete has eight kids, a dozen dogs, and friendly neighbors who constantly disrupt the flow of one tale and prompt the start of another, it’s an ever-changing process. The Scrivers wrap an anti-colonialism message in a story that extends from the 1980s to dystopian 2028 and from Pete’s lively, cluttered home to the supermarket frozen food aisle. Characters might have an onion for a head or a balloon for a nose. And car seats listen to and comment on the news in this brilliantly inventive mix of brotherly love, family ties, and Canadian history. —Pam Grady