MovieChat Forums > Atanarjuat (2002) Discussion > What year does this film take place?

What year does this film take place?


Perhaps a bit of a trick question that someone raised to me the other day, but I must admit there doesn't seem to be any way to make any kind of accurate estimation. What do you think?

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Umm before 1000AD, the first visit of Vikings in the western arctic.

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Why is then the guy on the cover wearing sunglasses?

PS! I haven't seen the movie...

My movies: http://www.imdb.com/mymovies/list?l=10363918

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"Why is then the guy on the cover wearing sunglasses? "

they must be made of bone.


"There's nothing uncool about healthy teeth and bones!"
-- The Mayor

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Not 'sunglasses' as such - that's a visor to protect their eyes from glare, snow blindness, cold winds and blowing snow - the dark 'slots' are the only part they can see through. I think the cover picture has been deliberately altered slightly, to make them resemble a 'modern' pair of sunglasses and increase the film's appeal.

However the sheen on them could be natural if the visor is made from shell e.g. oyster or mussel (ideal shape) cleaned and polished by scraping the surface smooth.

This is something of legendary story/cautionary tale handed down through generations so it could be from any time in history; there is no specific time.

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I'd have to agree there doesn't seem to be any way to judge what time period this film is supposed to take place in. Probably only the filmmakers or an Inuit historian could tell you that. There is no mention of Europeans in this film so we can perhaps assume it took place before contact was made between the people of Igloolik and Europeans. According to wikipedia, first European contact was in 1822 when British Navy ships HMS Fury and HMS Hecla, under the command of Captain William Edward Parry, wintered in Igloolik. As far as I know, there is no concrete evidence that the vikings ever came West of Newfoundland on any of their pre-Columbian ventures. In "Saga of the Greenlanders" it states that Leif Ericson perhaps set foot on the southeastern shoreline of what is now Baffin Island, but this is still quite a ways from the island which Igloolik is situated on. Therefore, Atanarjuat's incredible naked escape could have taken place as late as 1821 and as early as several thousand years before that. One could probably make a more accurate prediction based on the tools the Inuit used, but unfortunately, I'm not an archaeologist.

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According to its website, it takes place at "the dawn of the first millenium."


http://atanarjuat.com/legend/legend_film.php

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