A bewitching, if factually compromised, ethnographic document. A multicultural one as well, perhaps, given the society safely hidden behind the camera — a society according to Dean W. Duncan was both "witness to and a harbinger of [Inuit] obliteration".
As the first commercially successful feature-length documentary, its historical placement is seminal and its influence undeniable, but the legacies of subhumanizing portrayals of Indigenous peoples as presented as objective truth and the foundation it laid for extractive practices that continue to this day in nonfiction film are forces that we are obligated to contend with.
— Adam Piron (Documentary Magazine)
Synopsis: This pioneering documentary film depicts the lives of the indigenous Inuit people of Canada's northern Quebec region. Although the production contains some fictional elements, it vividly shows how its resourceful subjects survive in such a harsh climate, revealing how they construct their igloo homes and find food by hunting and fishing. The film also captures the beautiful, if unforgiving, frozen landscape of the Great White North, far removed from conventional civilization.