DATE: June 21, 2022
TIME: 7:00pm – 9:30pm
LOCATION: The Cinematheque, 1131 Howe Street
Isuma ᐃᓱᒪ: To Think, To See
- Maliglutit (ᒪᓕᒡᓗᑎᑦ) (Searchers)
- Canada 2016
- Zacharias Kunuk, Natar Ungalaaq
- 94 min. DCP
The Western goes Northern in Zacharias Kunuk’s masterful third feature, co-directed with Atanarjuat actor Natar Ungalaaq and made through Kingulliit Productions, the successor to Igloolik Isuma Productions. Drawing inspiration from John Ford’s seminal 1954 Western The Searchers (from which Maliglutit takes its English title, sans article), this captivating, crystalline rescue-revenge story, set across the Arctic tundra of 1913 Nunavut, has an Inuk caribou hunter (Benjamin Kunuk) in pursuit of marauders who ravaged his home and abducted his wife. Co-writers Kunuk and Norman Cohn, Isuma principals both, cleverly absorb and undress the archetypes of the Western, telling a generic tale of violent retribution that forgoes the cowboy-“Indian” binary. Cinematographer Jonathan Frantz (also co-producer) captures the immensity of the barren frozen landscape on a scale befitting Ford’s Monument Valley vistas. The cast, many non-actors, is entirely Inuit; Inuk throat singer Tanya Tagaq contributes to the soundtrack. In Inuktitut with English subtitles.
This complimentary National Indigenous Peoples Day screening of Maliglutit is presented as part of “Cinema Thinks the World,” a partnership project between UBC and The Cinematheque. Video introduction by Zacharias Kunuk. After the film, there will be a short reception followed by a one-hour panel talk with audience discussion.
Maliglutit panellists are William Brown, Jonathan Frantz, Ilinca Iurascu, and Christopher Rea.
Reviews
“Kunuk has created another timeless fable of the Far North.” – Chris Knight, National Post
“With a tale as timeless as the landscape in which it is set, Canada’s foremost Inuk filmmaker has provided us with another classic.” TIFF
“Immediate and compelling … Ingenious … Its images [are] packed with almost mythic intensity.” Norman Wilner, Now Toronto
“Cinema Thinks the World” is sponsored by the Public Humanities Hub at the University of British Columbia. Through a series of public screenings, panel talks, and discussions, it aims to explore the ways in which global cinema represents and helps us to think about the world.
