Northern adventure grounded in universal themes of family
Nearly a century ago, filmmaker Robert J. Flaherty directed “Nanook of the North,” a groundbreaking documentary account of Inuit life.
The film, which was first shown in 1922, was named one of the top 10 documentaries ever produced in a 2014 poll in the British film magazine Sight & Sound.
Ninety-six years later, Bulgarian director Milko Lazarov tackled similar subject matter in his 2018 film “Aga” — a fictional work centering on an Inuit couple in Siberia that nonetheless references Flaherty’s documentary.
“The main character in the movie is named Nanook,” Lazarov, a resident of Sofia, Bulgaria, said recently by email.
“I wanted to associate the character with that old Nanook, exactly 100 years ago,” Lazarov said. “On the one hand, as a tribute to Flaherty; on the other, as an extension of our idea of the
brave hunter, the lord of the North.”
“Aga” will be screened Saturday afternoon at the Wexner Center for the Arts.
Shot in the Yakutia republic of Russia, the film centers on the long-married Nanook (Mikhail Aprosimov) and his wife, Sedna (Feodosia Ivanova), whose simple, traditional lifestyle as hunters is rejected by their worldly adult daughter, Aga (Galina Tikhonova).
Lazarov traces the project to his childhood, when he became familiar with tales of adventurers.
“As a kid, I got excited about stories about the North,” Lazarov said. “I read with fascination the books of the great discoverers, especially (Roald) Amundsen’s books.”
In preparing to make “Aga,” the director said that he studied “the lives and habits of Inuit people around the world” but was not constrained by facts in dreaming up the story.
“The main dramatic design of the film is fiction,” said Lazarov, who cowrote the film with Simeon Ventsislavov.
Indeed, the conflict between Nanook, Sedna and their offspring can be comprehended by members of any culture.
“There are several lines in the film,” Lazarov said. “The main one ... is the family. The decay of family values in the context of modern times.”
“Aga” has won critical praise for its stately photography, which was captured using 35 mm film.
“Film is much better for the harsh atmospheric conditions under which the film was shot,” said Lazarov, adding that, although the temperatures were minus-22 degrees when shooting began, “Work on the film went unusually smooth. No incidents, no breakdown of technology, no disease.”
Less stark than the visuals of “Aga” is the music, which includes selections from Gustav Mahler’s “Symphony No. 5” and original music by Penka Kouneva.
“She wrote wonderful music for several key scenes,” Lazarov said. “My work with Penka has taught me many things, (including) how to tell the same emotion with different languages of art.”
Although the film represents a remote part of the world, “Aga” has found receptive audiences in most places where it has been shown. The director can only speculate about the reasons why.
“Really, I do not know,” he said. “Probably because everyone loves their family. The viewer understands the metaphor of the film and experiences it. This is how cinema works.”