Nanook of the North
About Nanook of the North
The film follows an Inuk man it calls Nanook, his wife Nyla, and their family on the Ungava Peninsula in northern Quebec as they travel, hunt, and trade. They take a kayak to a trading post with fox, seal, and polar-bear skins. Nanook hunts walrus, builds an igloo, and fishes through the ice. At the post a trader plays a gramophone; Nanook bites the record. Robert Flaherty staged several of these scenes.
Cast & crew
More about Nanook of the North
Robert J. Flaherty wrote, directed, photographed, edited, and produced it, with Frances H. Flaherty also credited on the writing. Revillon Frères backed it. He shot from August 1920 to August 1921. Pathé Exchange distributed. Nanook is Allakariallak; Flaherty picked the name because he thought it would sell. Nyla is Maggie Nujarluktuk.
Themes
Background
Shot in 1920–21 in northern Quebec and premiered on 11 June 1922, it was sold as a record of a way of hunting that guns and trading posts were already changing.
In film history
It is the film usually cited as the first feature-length documentary to make a commercial success, and the arguments about what Flaherty staged have stayed attached to it.
Making
Flaherty lived with the hunt he was filming. The half-open igloo and the gramophone bit are the staging details later writers always come back to.
Reviews
Roger Ebert wrote that if you stage a walrus hunt it still involves a walrus, and the walrus has not seen the script. He called Nanook one of the most vital human beings ever recorded on film.
Audiences
It found a paying audience and is described as the first feature-length documentary to show that the form could make money.
Look
Flaherty shot it himself with one camera, including the walrus hunt and the half-open igloo.
Music
Silent. No original score is named.
Preservation
Selected for the National Film Registry in 1989. Prints circulate, including a Criterion DVD (1999) and a Flicker Alley Blu-ray (2013).
Notes
- The igloo was built about 25 feet across, with half the dome left open so the camera could see in, and the cold came in with it.
- The trading-post visit, including the gramophone, was scripted. Allakariallak already knew what a record was.
- Flaherty had him hunt with older methods instead of a gun.
- Another woman in the film, Cunayou, was a common-law wife of Flaherty. Nyla later had Flaherty's son, Josephie.
- Flaherty said Allakariallak starved to death within two years. He died at home, likely of tuberculosis.
- The Library of Congress placed it on the National Film Registry in 1989.
- Criterion issued a DVD in 1999. Flicker Alley issued a Blu-ray in 2013.
Scenes
- Nanook bites the gramophone record at the trading post.
- The family builds an igloo left half open for the camera.
- The walrus hunt, which Flaherty staged and which still has a live animal in it.
Also available
- Internet Archive (nanookOfTheNorth1922)
- Criterion Collection DVD (1999)
- Flicker Alley Blu-ray (2013)
