Jenn-ook of the North

Have you been considering that thing I've been blogging about, the sending my wife to the North Pole thing? If you want to do me a solid, you should send her to the North Pole, because that means I'd be in my house without my wife, because she'd be at the North Pole and all.

Let me tell you about another fella who was lucky enough to have his wife up at the North Pole, but unlucky enough to be up the there with her: Nanook.

Let's hope Jenn doesn't return
from the North Pole looking like this.

Nanook was an Inuit hunter who was the subject of the classic and influential documentary Nanook of the North, filmed by the so-called "father of the documentary," Robert J. Flaherty. One assumes that American folks in their warm theaters in June 1922 were enthralled by the life-and-death exploits of a lone man battling the harsh elements while hunting walrus and seal with a harpoon in order to feed his rather good-looking wife and child.

Just like Michael Moore some 80 years later, Flaherty was not the kind of documentarian to let facts get in the way of a forced point of view. Nanook's real name was Allakariallak (I guess Allakariallak of the Arctic wouldn't have been a catchy name), and the lady playing his wife was not really not-Nanook's wife, but rather (according to Wikipedia) the common-law wife of Flaherty!

Meet "Nyla," who was supposedly "Nanook's" wife
but was allegedly hooking up with the American
shooting the movie. Could you blame him?

(Oh, and not-Nanook actually did hunt with modern weapons, like guns, but Flaherty thought primitive tools would add more suspense to the hunting scenes — which it did, since the animals he hunted were no less ferocious than they were before!)

Even if you discount some of the staged-for-the-camera bits, it must have been a drag for a married couple to share a tiny igloo. Jenn burned the chicken cutlets the other night; could you imagine what she'd do to a slab of walrus blubber?

If Jenn wins the trip to the North Pole — and she will if you help vote for her essay — she'll be living in luxury compared to poor non-Nanook. Flaherty claimed that the Inuit fellow died of starvation two years after he was filmed, but he actually (supposedly) died of tuberculosis at home as peacefully as one could die of tuberculosis.

There is one thing that Nanook of the North and Jenn, My Wife, Goes to the North Pole would have in common: the former was a silent movie, and the latter would bring some silence to me for a couple of weeks! Maybe during her absence I'll be able to catch up on harpoon practice.

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If this convinces you that you should send my wife to the North Pole, please click this text which is in fact a link that will take you to her essay so you can vote for her so she'll have a chance to go to the North Pole. Thank you.