Documentary Educational Resources - Filmmaker / Elder, Sarah / All Films

Alaska Native Heritage Film Series

Wed, 5 Sep 2018 11:07:00 GMT

Alaska Native Heritage Film Series
Buy Now: $2,070.00

Filmmakers Sarah Elder and Len Kamerling produced these films jointly with village councils. Since 1974, the Alaska Native Heritage Film Project has pioneered a community-based approach to producing cultural films in which the film's subjects play a central role in determining the production's themes and direction. The goal of this approach is to produce documentary films that are closer to the perspectives and priorities of the indigenous and minority people they represent. This technique was developed to ensure authentic Alaskan native material and point of view. Each of the communities represented helped to decide the direction and content of the films.

Films in the Alaska Native Heritage Film series:

At the Time of Whaling

The Drums of Winter (Uksuum Cauyai)

From the First People

Note on Term "Eskimo":

The films in this series make use of the name "Eskimo." While once broadly applied, it is a perjorative term and considered offensive. While the inception of the word is a matter of debate, it is no longer used or applied in our film catalog. The context in which the term appears in this series is an acknowledged relic of a colonial past, presented in its original version. DER apologizes for any offense caused.

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The Drums of Winter

Thu, 30 Aug 2018 07:05:00 GMT

The Drums of Winter
Buy Now: $340.00

Digitally Remastered DVD Edition

This feature-length documentary explores the traditional dance, music and spiritual world of the Yup'ik people of Emmonak, a remote village at the mouth of the Yukon River on the Bering Sea coast. The Drums of Winter (Uksuum Cauyai) gives an intimate look at a way of life of which most of us have seen only glimpses. Dance was once at the heart of the community's spiritual and social life. It was the bridge between the ancient and the new, the living and the dead and a person's own power and the greater powers of the unseen world.

In The Drums of Winter, the people of Emmonak tell us through actualities and interviews how their history, social values and spiritual beliefs are woven around the songs and dances that have been handed down to them through the generations. We also learn that it is not just old songs that are important; new songs and dance movements are created to reflect modern life with all its complexities. Each time a person gets up to dance, he is strengthening the continuity of the ages, and insuring the survival of his culture.

The film follows the elders of Emmonak as they prepare for the coming ceremonial gathering (potlatch) with a neighboring village. In the Kashim (qasgiq or men's house), they practice their songs and painstakingly work out the motions of the dances. Each movement has meaning and plays a part in telling a story. In the days before television, radio, bingo and weekly basketball games, dance was the sole means of entertainment. Throughout the film, archival photographs and film footage accompany the words of early missionaries who brought Christianity to the area. These sequences provide a historical context for the film and give us a strong sense of the resilience of Yup'ik culture, having survived despite a century of missionary suppression.

Films in the Alaska Native Heritage Film series:

At the Time of Whaling

The Drums of Winter (Uksuum Cauyai)

From the First People

Note on Term "Eskimo":

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From the First People

Wed, 29 Aug 2018 14:53:00 GMT

From the First People
Buy Now: $320.00

This is a film about change and contemporary life in Shungnak, a village on the Kobuk River in northwestern Alaska, 75 miles north of the Arctic Circle. Life in this inland community is dominated by the seasons and the river.

In October, when the film begins, the Kobuk becomes filled with ice, which slowly thickens until freeze-up is complete. Traditional subsistence activities still continue: women net fish under the ice, and a man and his wife construct a cottonwood mudshark trap that is carefully placed in the river ice. The combination of old and new technology is pervasive. Some people hitch their teams of huskies to a sled, others travel by snowmobile. Old people reflect upon these changes. "In the old days," George Cleveland laughs, "you knew your good dogs would get you home. Today, if your snowmachine breaks down, you have to walk! On the other hand," he says, "most things these days are easier than in the past, when people had to be tough in order to survive. Today, you just plug in the bubbling coffee pot, pull the string for light, and turn the stove's knob when you are cold." Indeed, popcorn is cooking on the stove as children don masks for Halloween trick-or-treating.

The film reveals that life along the Kobuk River is still inextricably linked to the harsh and starkly beautiful land, where the December sun rises at 11 a.m. and sets three hours later. An old man shares his feelings about the changes he has seen: "Long ago, forest fires put themselves out. Today, even when men fight them, they burn. I think our earth is getting old, and when things get old and dry they burn. Our earth is the same way," he adds. "It's ready to burn. I think it's coming close to the time when we will have a new one."

Films in the Alaska Native Heritage Film series:

At the Time of Whaling

The Drums of Winter (Uksuum Cauyai)

From the First People

Note on Term "Eskimo":

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On the Spring Ice

Tue, 28 Aug 2018 13:51:00 GMT

On the Spring Ice
Buy Now: $320.00

Walrus as well as whales are hunted by the Siberian Yupik of Gambell on St. Lawrence Island. As the film opens, an old man tells of the dangers of moving ice, how people used to drift on such ice and never return. A cluster of men stand on a snowy rooftop, scanning the sea ice for walrus, when one spots a skin boat in distress far out on the ice. The crew had not come home the night before, and now were drifting toward Siberia. Long ago, there was nothing that could have been done to save them. Today, the men call the Coast Guard.

The next day, preparations for another walrus hunt are made. The hunters load the boat and travel fifty miles out to sea, where they spot two walrus sunning themselves on an ice floe. "Don't move," one hunter tells the camera. The walrus are shot, admired, butchered on the ice, and loaded onto the boat. Back in the village, the meat is cut and hung to dry.

Films in the Alaska Native Heritage Film series:

At the Time of Whaling

The Drums of Winter (Uksuum Cauyai)

From the First People

Note on Term "Eskimo":

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The Reindeer Thief

Tue, 28 Aug 2018 08:59:00 GMT

The Reindeer Thief
Buy Now: $275.00

Like many St. Lawrence Island legends, this story is set in Siberia where Chukchi, the Reindeer People, live.

Pelaasi, an elder from Gambell, speaks Siberian Yupik. His mythical story, about a man who goes out in search of a reindeer thief, is an ungipaghaq, a tale that has been passed down unchanged through generations and believed to be based in truth.

Films in the Alaska Native Heritage Film series:

At the Time of Whaling

The Drums of Winter (Uksuum Cauyai)

From the First People

Note on Term "Eskimo":

Visit Elder, Sarah to see additional products in this category.

Tununeremiut

Mon, 27 Aug 2018 08:57:00 GMT

Tununeremiut
Buy Now: $295.00

Four sequences, filmed over a two-month period, portray aspects of the lives of the people of Tununak, a village on the south-western coast of Alaska. In the first, the villagers evacuate their homes and camp on higher ground, fearing that a Nuclear test on Amchitka Island, 1000 miles away, may cause a tidal wave. In a quietly ironic scene, the villagers listen to the countdown on their radios, wondering if this modern blast will bring forth an ancient disaster.

In the second vignette, a group of men travel by snowmobile to place fish traps under the river ice. They become lost in heavy fog, blinded by the glare of the ice, and confused by the complicated turns of the rivers in a landscape where the only landmarks are short, low-lying bushes or old fish traps. In spite of the difficulty of seeing, they discuss their quandary calmly and eventually find their way.

A sudden storm from the Bering sea hits Tununak with gale force winds and heavy snow. Laundry blows wildly in the wind as people prepare for the storm.

The concluding sequence captures communal warmth as people gather in the meeting hall for traditional story-dancing. All participate: men beating drums, and singing, women dancing, adorned with beaded headbands and feathery finger masks. The dancing in Tununak still provides an important outlet for individual expression, at the same time communicating the village's unwritten history.

Films in the Alaska Native Heritage Film series:

At the Time of Whaling

The Drums of Winter (Uksuum Cauyai)

From the First People

Note on Term "Eskimo":

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At the Time of Whaling

Wed, 18 Jul 2018 13:31:00 GMT

At the Time of Whaling
Buy Now: $295.00

Gambell, Alaska is a Yupik-speaking community on St. Lawrence Island on the Bering Sea. Here, as on the coast, sea mammals are still the major source of food. During their three-week Spring migration through the Bering Channel, whales are hunted using a combination of traditional organization and recently introduced technology such as motors and darting guns. A bowhead whale weighs about one ton per foot, and may reach seventy feet in length. Working together, even fifteen Yupik skin boats with up to ten persons on each boat cannot assure a safe venture or the taking of a whale.

From a rooftop several men with binoculars view the sea ice for open water and other signs of migrating whales. Conditions are good as the men hoist their sails. Someone spots a whale and shouts the news through the CB radio, and the other boats drop sail, rev up their motors, and join the first boat. Together the fifteen boats capture the whale and tow it to the shore ice, where the men begin the three-day task of butchering and distributing the meat to the crew and to another village on the island. An old man recounts the way whaling used to be.

SELECTED SCREENINGS & AWARDS

CINE Golden Eagle

Blue Ribbon, American Film Festival

Chris Bronze Award, Film Festival of Greater Columbus

Films in the Alaska Native Heritage Film series:

At the Time of Whaling

The Drums of Winter (Uksuum Cauyai)

From the First People

Note on Term "Eskimo":

Visit Elder, Sarah to see additional products in this category.