Anthony Quinn isn't yet Zorba the Greek. He's Inok the Eskimo and he is presented here to ll be so naive and childlike that to try to get through his story is like being left alone on an ice flow just so a polar bear can eat you. The film is manipulative because with its snowy white photography and shots of various northern animal species, the viewer is captivated immediately by being in this savage world where people have survived without the comforts of civilization for centuries, or so we are told to believe.
I have read about the inaccuracies of the perception of the Eskimo culture, and I tend to believe that after seeing this. Certainly, the civilized world is not the world that would be theirs before they were discovered by outsiders. The idea that Eskimos are savage innocents is just another Hollywood manipulation to present a world outside of their own as something barbaric and something that needs to be changed. Humanity has been doing that for centuries, and Hollywood has shown how that backfires.
Quinn's character has a bit of a caveman/barbaric mentality, and he instigates fights with neighbors at one moment then joins them in socializing the next. When he ventures to civilization to trade in the first he has caught, he accidentally kills a missionary when he offers him his wife and the missionary, aghast, refuses.
Quinn then returns to his residence as if nothing has happened, along the way assisting an old woman who has been left in the middle of nowhere to find her eternal fate. Anna May Wong makes one of her final appearances in this cameo, and while her scene is very touching, this is just another one of those old assumptions about Eskimos that once again proves the movie to be way off base in the way it presents their culture.
While this is shot in gorgeous widescreen and shows off at least a studio sets version of the northern territories, it becomes ghastly to try to get through without discussed in nearing 2 hours. Peter O'Toole makes a brief appearance as a pilot searching for Quinn, and that gives this a bit of historical curiosity. I've never been so angered that a movie could have me riveted because of the photography but furious over the story and the abuse of the facts. As a huge fan of Quinn's, I expected much more than what ends up being represented here.
I have read about the inaccuracies of the perception of the Eskimo culture, and I tend to believe that after seeing this. Certainly, the civilized world is not the world that would be theirs before they were discovered by outsiders. The idea that Eskimos are savage innocents is just another Hollywood manipulation to present a world outside of their own as something barbaric and something that needs to be changed. Humanity has been doing that for centuries, and Hollywood has shown how that backfires.
Quinn's character has a bit of a caveman/barbaric mentality, and he instigates fights with neighbors at one moment then joins them in socializing the next. When he ventures to civilization to trade in the first he has caught, he accidentally kills a missionary when he offers him his wife and the missionary, aghast, refuses.
Quinn then returns to his residence as if nothing has happened, along the way assisting an old woman who has been left in the middle of nowhere to find her eternal fate. Anna May Wong makes one of her final appearances in this cameo, and while her scene is very touching, this is just another one of those old assumptions about Eskimos that once again proves the movie to be way off base in the way it presents their culture.
While this is shot in gorgeous widescreen and shows off at least a studio sets version of the northern territories, it becomes ghastly to try to get through without discussed in nearing 2 hours. Peter O'Toole makes a brief appearance as a pilot searching for Quinn, and that gives this a bit of historical curiosity. I've never been so angered that a movie could have me riveted because of the photography but furious over the story and the abuse of the facts. As a huge fan of Quinn's, I expected much more than what ends up being represented here.