Excercise 3.4 ask to consider the 3 films together as a representation of the genre of constructed observational documentary and while I feel that that are all good movies and have reviewed the individually everyone has its strengths and weaknesses.

When you read into the history of “Nanook of the North”, the illusion to a degree is stripped away. It’s  clear that the film is almost fictional in its portrayal on the Inuits in 1920’s Canada. The family was constructed and costumed in traditional clothes that they no longer wore and filmed undertaking hunting practices that in reality the no longer did. However, the film is put together in such away even to a modern audience the deception is not evident.

It how it was put together this clearly make “Nanook of the North” a direct peer of “The Last Trapper” which I feel personally is the weakest of the three films. As I have mentioned in my earlier review, it feels more like a badly acted movie than a documentary. Like “Nanook of the North” the photography is stunning, and it puts forward the subject matter well, but the dramatization, wooden dialogue and overly dramatic “inner voice” voice over weaken the overall film. However, perhaps it is just that this, not a silent movie that is making it superior to it 1922 predecessor. If we could hear Nanook, I’m sure we would just be as stilted.

Village at the End of the World is much more contemporary and reflects the social attitudes of the community compared to the world as a whole much better than either of its predecessor. The previous film appears to be more structured toward the landscape, the Human interaction at the sideline to it whereas in “Village” it is the villagers social problemds that are the subject matter and the landscape is the bit player.

I think this is a way of film culture has evolved from showing us visually something we have not seen before but to showing is now something social we have not seen before – the real effects on peoples lives that isolation brings.

Village at the End of the World (2012)

Director: Sarah Gavron, David Katznelson

Summary: Village At The End Of The World is a witty, surprising and ultimately feel good portrait of an isolated village of 59 people and 100 sledge dogs, surviving against the odds.. (IMDb)

Synopsis: Shot over the course of a year in Northern Greenland, the film intrudes audiences to a remote village with more dogs than people. The film focuses on four townsfolk from the tiny population of 59 – Lars, the only teenager; Karl, the huntsman who has never acknowledged that Lars is his son; Ilanngauq, the outsider who moved to Niaqornat after meeting his wife on-line; and Annie, the elder who remembers the ways of the Shaman and a time when the lights were fueled by seal blubber. In this astutely constructed real-life drama, we see how the economic and ecological future of the community is more fragile than its hardy inhabitants. (IMDb)

Review:

Like the other 2 films watched in this section, this is an attempt by the filmmakers to show us life as it is in somewhere we have not seen before and director Sarah Gavron put this forward in a very modern way.

While the village its self is visually breathtaking the film focus’s on a few of the villagers and show how life for them there is becoming increasingly difficult following the closure of the fish processing factory. The film concentrates on the globalisation focus on how the villagers need not only the fish plant to survive but, Facebook, Premiership football, cruise ship passengers, hip hop and internet dating.

The villages only teenager gives the film a dark view at times, as you can relate to his complete loneliness, his only family is his Grandmother, he treats his mother as a sister (at best) and he his father has never acknowledged he is his father. He dreams of friends and education and adventure – up this must be hard when you are one of 8 in a classroom where you peers are often 10 years younger than you.

This film its self is presented differently to “Nanook of the North” and “The Last Trapper” as there is no feeling of the contrived story just honest interaction between the villages and the film crew. The villagers seem at ease with the camera and react naturally the question posed by the team to provide detail of the life in the village.

The Last Trapper (2004)

Director: Nicolas Vanier

Synopsis: A trapper and his wife brave the harsh Yukon climate, treacherous landscape and dangerous wildlife in an attempt to live a life of solitude.

Review:

What can I say about this film, I enjoyed watching although it felt like a guilty pleasure.

The film sets out to be a documentary to show the life of a trapper over the winter season in the Canadian Yukon territory, using real-life trapper Norman Winther and his wife May Loo. However, because of it constructed narrative style and over dramatisation of individual events, mainly the sledge through the ice, I find it hard not to see it other that a poorly acted film that looks stunning.

The cinematography of the Candian wilderness is second to none, as we follow Norman on his daily routine through the winter living a life that has hardly changed in over 150 years we cannot fail to top drawn into the beauty of the scenes. However, the wooden performances of the mainly leads, which at times appears uncomfortable damages the documentary nature of the film. Reading further into the movie it seems much of the film is dramatised, an animal supply company provides the animals and the voices of Mary and Norman were also dubbed on afterwards by actors.

I find myself asking why the filmmaker choose this route; why did he not just make this a dramatised film based on the life of Norman, this would still have the amazing photography but not the “bad acting” or not stay with a straight documentary and avoid the contrived story. Either of these options would have created a far superior film to what we have in front of us which is best described as worthy effort.

Nanook of the North (1922)

Director: Robert J. Flaherty

Synopsis: In what is wildly regarded as the first feature length documentary; Robert J. Flaherty charts the life of Inuit Nanook and his family over a year living within the Artic Circle in Northern Canada.

Review

I have found this picture fascinating for a couple of reasons; one of which I now know why when as I child I was wrapped up against the cold my Grandad would say “It’s Nanook of the North!”.

It’s not often a film passingh into popular culture like that, and with “Nanook of the North” its is not hard to understand why. Despite it age this feel feels fresh to watch, the cinematography and filming style is unobtrusive. There is a nice fly on the wall feel when you watch this film. The film attempts to show the Inuit way of life, spearfish, the traditional clothing, building igloos etc before such thing disappeared. The film is attempting also to show the audience something they have never seen before and this is something that it does well and any film maker making a similar documentary today I think would be proud to produce a film to quality on “Nanook of the North” .

However, it is not all as rose coloured as it would appear the Inuit life the film so wonderfully portrays was not vanishing, it had vanished. Flaherty stated many of the scenes, placing the protagonist into traditional clothing they no longer used and it is said that Nanook was not even related to the rest of his “family”. The action maybe staged but the scenery cannot be be, it was made in a different era and it was a valiant effort to show us life as it was.

In this 1960’s interview on of cinema’s masters talks through 3 different style of editing.

Montage – he describes this as more assembly than cutting as mosaic. He references the the famous shower scene of “Psycho”. I would be impossible just to show a nude woman being violently stabbed on scene. But by stylistically assembling little suggestive shots the effect is achieved. this scene used approx 78 shots in 45 seconds.

Orcestral: Here Hitchcock talk about how he varied shot length to create impact and shock. As it the 2nd murder in “Psycho”

Finally Hitchcock explains it alos the order of film and context that sets the meaning as Eisenstein did before, what you place in-between identical shots changes the impression. From kindly old gentleman to dirty old man for example.

As with the previous post Filmmaker IQ have produced a relevant and insightful film, explaining the background to “The Soviet Theory of Montage” which is essential to under stand the subtles of the film making of Sergei Eisenstien in “Battleship Potemkin” and Vladimir Pudovkin in “Mother”

The Soviet Union was very quick to embrace cinema as a tool for propaganda and this style of editing – an development of Griffiths style in “Intolerance” was instrumental in their success.