I saw this movie many years ago. My recollection of it is that is a documentary comment on the interface of two widely different cultures. I also just finished reading Kabloona a book written by a white Frenchman in the later 1930s about the Eskimo Culture. The points made in the book confirm those points made in the movie. The Eskimo apparently is a guileless innocent whose life consists primarily of staying alive and fed. The innocence of these people was highlighted in the scene where Anthony Quinn came back to his igloo and found that his wife had given birth. He asked her the baby's name and when she told him, he responded in amazement, "How did you know?" As far as the scene where a man's hands were stuffed into a recently killed dog is concerned, the speed with which freezing occurs at 50 below zero is not to be believed. That scene demonstrates the fact that the Eskimo regards his dogs as livestock and useful. Shocking, but apparently realistic.
Review of The Savage Innocents
