Zacharias Kunuk’s (Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner, Maliglutit) latest film observes Noah Piugattuk (Apayata Kotierk), an elder in his small community of both young and old, as he leads them in seal hunting, like their ancestors before them. But it is a time of change: 1961. When hunting, Piugattuk and his group are visited by a white man, known only as “The Boss” (Kim Bodnia), who, through a translator, tells Piugattuk they need to move to a settlement in Igloolik, forgoing their traditional lifestyle and allowing their children to receive Canadian schooling. This encounter speaks volumes. While it is highly specific to time, space, and people, it is an interaction which has played out countless times, in countless communities across Canada, usually with the same outcome. Through the nuance of language and the complexity of translating ideology across tongues, Kunuk preserves a pivotal historical moment, previously only kept alive through an oral tradition, in both micro and macro detail.

In many ways, the film is a balance of contradictions. It has the feel of a documentary, yet every shot is deliberate and precise. The story pivots on a lengthy and frustrating attempted communication which expertly illustrates the futility of a conversation in which neither party can, nor wishes to, understand the other. It highlights the failures of government-Indigenous relations with a sense of foreboding tragedy that nods to the historical context. This strange and dangerous conversation, initially at least, seems like nothing more than friendly small talk. It is these contradictions which draw you in, making what could have been drab, mesmerizing and thrilling. These small dichotomies in the film gain further meaning when expanded to the larger dichotomies of the Inuit and the White Man.