NANOOK OF THE NORTH / THE WEDDING OF PALO
Robert Flaherty made this wonderful film of Eskimo (Inuit) life following six years as an Artic explorer for the Canadian Northern Railway. Flaherty seized upon the idea of structuring his movie around characters who reenacted episodes of their lives and participated in the shaping of the film. He was not trained as an anthropologist, but Flaherty wisely guides our discovery of the people and their activities, and ninety years later, NANOOK OF THE NORTH remains as completely engaging as it was in 1922, a huge influence on many ethnographic films that followed. This edition is mastered in high definition at the visually correct speed from the painstaking 35mm restoration of 1972, with a lovely orchestral score composed, compiled and conducted by Timothy Brock. Selected for the National Film Registry, 1989.
THE WEDDING OF PALO (Palos Brudefaerd) (1934), Nanook’s obvious successor, is the last beautiful work of the famed Danish polar explorer and anthropologist Dr. Knud Rasmussen. Filmed in sound with an Inuit cast from the Angmagssalik district of east Greenland, Palo, like Nanook, documents a vanishing lifestyle and uses Flaherty’s devise of an appealing narrative; in this case, a story of two men who desire the same woman as a wife. It is mastered in high definition and digitally restored from an original 35mm nitrate print in the collection of George Eastman House.
This Blu-Ray also contains six extraordinary bonus films. NANOOK REVISITED (SAUMIALUK) by Claude Massot, made in the same locations used by Flaherty, shows how Inuit life changed in the intervening decades, how Flaherty consciously depicted a culture which was then already vanishing, and how Nanook is used today to teach the Inuit their heritage. Nanook Revisited was produced in 1988 on standard definition video for French television. DWELLINGS OF THE FAR NORTH (1928) is the igloo-building sequence of Nanook re-edited and re-titled as an educational film; ARCTIC HUNT (1913) and extended excerpts from PRIMITIVE LOVE (1927) are by Arctic explorer Frank E. Kleinschmidt; ESKIMO HUNTERS OF NORTHWEST ALASKA (1949) by Louis de Rochemont shows many activities seen in Nanook thirty years after, and FACE OF THE HIGH ARCTIC (1959) depicts the ecology of the region.
Contents
Format: Blu-ray / Region All
(No Regional Code)
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NANOOK OF THE NORTH
(US, 1922)
Director: Robert Flaherty
• 79 minutes
• B&W, Tinted
• Silent
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THE WEDDING OF PALO (PALOS BRUDEFAERD)
(Denmark, 1934)
Director: Dr. Knud Rasmussen
• 46 minutes
• B&W, Tinted
• Silent
_________________________________________
Bonus Material
NANOOK REVISTED (SAUMIALUK)
(US, 1988)
Director: Claude Massot
• 64 minutes
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CAPTAIN KLEINSCHMIDT'S ARTIC HUNT
(1913)
• 15 minutes
◊
PRIMITIVE LOVE
(US, 1927)
Director: Frank E. Kleinschmidt
• 12 minutes
• B&W
◊
HOUSES OF THE ARCTIC
(US, 1928)
Director: Robert Flaherty
Production Company: Pathé
• 11 minutes
◊
ESKIMO HUNTERS OF NORTHWESTERN ALASKA
(1949)
Director: Kay Norton
Producer: Louis deRochemont
• 20 minutes
◊
FACE OF THE HIGH ARCTIC
(1959)
Production Company: National Film Board of Canada
• 14 minutes
◊
Excerpts from MY ESKIMO FRIENDS by Robert Flaherty, 1924.
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Total Running Time: 04:41:00 (2 Discs)
Language: Silent with English intertitles & Sound with English subtitles
Musical Score: Composed, orchestrated and conducted by Timothy Brock
Booklet Text: Robert Flaherty & Lawrence Millman
Published By: Flicker Alley
Institutional Price: $300 (plus shipping)
To order call: 212.280.8654 or click here for information on ordering by fax, e-mail or post.