While reading these different authors and approaches to documentary filmmaking I found it very interesting how they discussed filmmakers’ and anthropologists’ work in contrasting ways. The discussion of Robert Flaherty’s work and in particular his film Nanook of the North was conflicting because his work was described as problematic by Broderick Fox and seemingly praised by Emilie De Brigard, Ilisa Barbash, and Lucien Taylor.
Even though the film was very much staged with Nanook (not his actual name) having a “family” created for the camera and engaging in practices that they no longer participated in (hunting without a gun) that may have caused physical harm, De Brigard admires his work as an artist while acknowledging there is some controversy. De Brigard writes, “Iris Barry’s attack on the authenticity of Nanook can never be well answered, since Flaherty, always the raconteur, did not leave a systematic record of its making…Flaherty’s gift was not that of a reporter or recorder, but rather that of a revealer” (22-23). De Brigard notes the fabricated aspect of the film, but praises Flaherty’s artistic style as a filmmaker.
One of the most problematic aspects of the film was Flaherty’s desire to have Nanook and others hunt in traditional ways despite the fact they no longer engaged in these practices. Broderick Fox notes, “Barnouw recounts a passage from Flaherty’s diary in which the filmmaker describes wanting to film a walrus hunt as it was done before contact with explorers introduced firearms. Nanook and his fellows agreed to hunt with harpoons for the sake of the camera and were dragged and thrown about by a harpooned walrus” (22). This act of hunting was only performed by the camera and staged by the filmmaker putting them in harm’s way. This entry from his diary is telling, “Flaherty wrote, ‘I filmed and filmed and filmed-The men-calling me to end the struggle by rifle-so fearful were they about being pulled into the sea.’ Flaherty admitted to have kept on filming, pretending he had not understood their pleas” (22). While Fox highlights this diary entry to shed light on Flaherty’s to cast doubt on approach in an ethical standpoint, Barbash and Taylor praise his methods of keeping the camera rolling as a crucial aspect of his style and discuss these scenes in a very contrasting way. “There is, for instance, a long and hilarious sequence of a seal hunt. Whereas other filmmakers might have cut between short close-up shots of various details of the hunt, Flaherty keeps the camera rolling and shows us Nanook, the ice hole, and eventually the seal, all in the same frame” (23). Flaherty’s choice to not intervene is simultaneously seen as indicative of an artistic style, but problematizes the relationship between filmmaker and subjects of the film when there is a great deal of risk.
Broderick Fox may have been the most critical of Flaherty’s practices while filming Nanook of the North, but still noted the influence it had in the world of film. Fox also critiqued the Flaherty’s creation of unequal power distribution and the positive reception of the film being at fault for the perpetuation of these disproportionate levels of power between the filmmakers and subjects. “The success of Nanook catalyzed a character-based, narrative approach to reality, but it also spawned a genre of films about native cultures and their ways that evolved into a problematic tradition of ethnographic film with distorted power dynamics between investigators and their subjects” (22). Barbash and Taylor disagree with this notion of disparity in control or influence of the film between Flaherty and Nanook even noting, “perhaps Nanook should have shared credit as filmmaker” (26). Fox’s framing of the power dynamic is challenged by Barbash and Taylor who note the influence Nanook had on the filmmaking process.“Nanook is still considered a seminal film in both ethnographic and documentary film traditions. In part this is because Flaherty showed more interest in the lives of indigenous people than any Western documentary filmmaker before him, and he collaborated with them to a degree that would still do many filmmakers credit today” (26). These takes on the relationship between Nanook and Flaherty and irreconcilable as Fox sees inequality while Barbash and Fox are commending the level of agency Nanook has, but both would agree this relationship as well as the film itself has effects on the filmmaking process today.
These readings were at times antithetical leading me to question how such opposing views can be formed. Although many of these arguments cannot be approached by viewing the film because they are about the filmmaking process and are not shown, I looked at some of these highly discussed scenes in order to better frame my opinion. Watching the struggle that ensues in the walrus hunt is difficult knowing the fear these men had. It is a struggle to view this as a documentary or visual anthropology piece knowing that this is not Nanook’s family, Nanook is also in many ways a fictional character, and the actions being performed are, just that, a performance. It is disturbing that Barbash and Taylor noted that even today filmmakers give credit to the methods used by Flaherty even in light of the ethical concerns they raise. I do not believe it is possible to separate the problematic methodology utilized in making the film in order to commend the work without regard to the consequences in the lives of the subjects of the film.
Danae Hart 