Sunday, June 1, 2008

An introduction to documentary films: Nanook of the North/Robert Flaherty

If you are brought up in India, chances are, you consider a documentary film to be a dull, boring film that has long-winded soporific commentary and an overdose of information. It's unfortunate that the only documentary films we have been exposed to are the really bad ones, propaganda films in disguise. And those, sadly, have formed a lasting impression of documentary films as a genre in our minds.

To change that impression, I would like to show you one of the first documentary films ever made. Nanook of the North gives us a glimpse into the lives of the Eskimos (Itivimuits for the politically correct) in Canada's Hudson Bay at the turn of the 20th century. I don't want to say much about it, except that it's everything you think a documentary isn't: entertaining, funny, dramatic. Most memorable for me is the scene when Nanook goes hunting for seals.

Watch Nanook of the North here.
http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_cc00XMTM3MTc5MDg=.html

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