Get Inuit

Comments (0) By Tara Jepsen Wednesday, Mar 31 2010

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Maybe you're a person of letters, or you’re just nonplussed by the heartless 3-D sugar-shock seduction of much cinema today. No one is asking you to keep those stupid glasses at home and buy yet another evolved television so things can fly out of the screen at your face. If gorgeous, stimulating, and actual artistry is more your thing, the Independent Inuit Film: The Fast Runner Trilogy is a boon to you. Straight from the Igloolik community in the Canadian Arctic, the films describe Inuit experience firsthand, rather than through the lens of Mel Gibson (perhaps he's more of a blackout curtain than a lens). Screening tonight is Before Tomorrow, the story of a young boy and his grandmother in 1840, living between the unforgiving Arctic wild and the first contact with white people; director Marie-Helene Cousineau appears for a Q&A after the screening. Atanarjuat, The Fast Runner (April 11) won the Camera d’Or at Cannes, and is the first feature ever made in the Inuktitut language. Finally, The Journals of Knud Rasmussen (April 17) depicts an Igloolik shaman and his daughter dealing with Christianity and commerce as they arrive in their world. It’s gimmick-free, stereotype-free cinema — a true radical experience.
Fri., April 9, 7:30 p.m.; Sun., April 11, 2 p.m.; Fri., April 23, 7:30 p.m., 2010