Agaguk

A fairly interesting, if flawed, movie. Toshiro Mifune was great, and could pass for an Eskimo. Lou Diamond Phillips is awfully tall and lean, though. And Jennifer Tilly, well she is beautiful, and she acted very well, but just does not even come close to seeming Eskimo. In a way this is the old story of Europeans interacting with indigenous peoples. As one character out it, "You need us! you no longer can survive without our rifles and our metal knives!" And the chieftain admits "we will die" Should we have left these people in their Stone Age condition? I don't think so. But it did mean the end of their ways of life. The Innuit only escaped the reservation system due to the remoteness of their homelands.But back to the movie, it is worth checking out if only for the photography.

Lou Diamond Phillips deserves a lot of credit for even tackling this subject. A well photographed movie about the lives of the Inuit, this just isn't a commercial item. The fact alone that it was shot on location must have cost a fortune. This film shows a lot of loving tender care in the making and the cast is great throughout. Too bad that it just wasn't commercial enough.

I happen to meet Lou in my town when he was appearing as King Arthur in a production of Camelot. I told him how much I liked the film and it was unfortunate that it went straight to video. I also asked him how he liked working with Toshiro Mifune.

He replied that it was a great experience, that Toshiro Mifune was a great actor and very good to work with and it was an honor to play his son in the film.

It must have been one rugged location, those films set at either of the Earth's poles usually are. The performances by Lou as the young Inuit outcast, Toshiro Mifune as his father the medicine man of the tribe and Donald Sutherland as a Mountie are uniformly excellent.

Don't miss this very neglected item.

The Far North in 1935 is the setting for this dull film. An Eskimo man falls out with his father, the tribal leader, over which of them gets "the woman". He and the woman must flee to parts unknown after he kills a man in self defense. Soon a mountie is on his trail which forces him to brave the frozen tundra alone while being stalked by a white wolf. All this sounds like it made for a good adventure tale, but it was just plain boring. And who was the moron who cast Jennifer Tilly as an eskimo? She looks about as much like an eskimo as the Reverend Jesse Jackson. This was a been there, done that, lame film from the very outset. Avoid!

The plot to "Shadow of the Wolf" is nearly identical at times to the 1933 film "Eskimo" as well as 1960's "The Savage Innocents"....so much so that I am surprised that IMDB doesn't list these in the connections section. All the films are about an innocent Inuit man being chased by Canadian Mounties for a murder.

The story begins with Agaguk (Lou Diamond Phillips) killing a polar bear with a knife! Despite this heroic deed, this father (Toshiro Mifune) is a bit of a jerk and they argue. Later, Agaguk learns that his father sold the polar bear pelt to a trader...even though it was not his to sell and the trader knew this. Agaguk feels annoyed...but before he can do more, the stupid trader tries to murder him...but is killed in the process. Clearly it's a case of self-defense...though soon he is chased by a Mountie (Donald Sutherland) and this makes up the rest of the film. But on his way to look for the killer, the Mountie stops by Agaguk to investigate...and Agaguk's father takes things into his own hands.

Like too many films, the natives in the film are all played by non-native actors (Phillips and Jennifer Tilly have a little native American blood...just a wee bit...and Mifune is Japanese). I am not sure if this is a bad thing or not, as I have no idea if there were any Inuit/First Nations/Eskimo (whatever term you use) actors who could have played these roles. It simply could have been done for marketability (putting stars in the leads) or there weren't native actors able to play these roles. I have no idea.

So is the film any good? Well, the filmmakers get the look of the film right and manage to make a compelling tale. It is interesting and kept my interest throughout. It's well worth seeing...and is better than its current score of 5.8. However, if you can find it, "Eskimo" is even better...and the two films are different enough it merits seeing them both.

I found this film to a little dull but what makes this one accurate is the fact that the way the Inuit are portrayed in it. They are depicted quite well for a Hollywood made flick. I'm very surprised how many actors of actual Inuit background were in this film. I know for a fact that they weren't just actors of other ethnic backgrounds pretending to be Inuit since their last names are actually Inuit names. All the other villagers were truly Inuit except for Lou Diamond Phillips and Jennifer Tilly. I love ANY film that deals with Native North Americans just as long as its not a typical Hollywood made movie that views them as "savages" or "heathens" who like to attack wagon trains!! I personally don't appreciate negative stereotypes like that.

But ........... however........ anyways........... this is the reason why I gave this film a 6 out of 10.