This silent film is a classic predecessor of modern documentaries. It records the one-year stay of director Robert J. Flaherty among the Inuits. It was ground-breaking in its combination of documentary and docudrama techniques. While expressing admiration for the skills and perseverance of indigenous people in the Canadian Arctic, and for their long term survival in that challenging environment, the film also reveals colonialist biases. The film was scripted based on a book of similar title, and is thus a partially fictional tale of an Inuk hunter and his family living in Inukjuak, Ungava, Canada. Nanook was played by an Itivimuit tribesman named Allakariallak. His family are followed as they fish, and hunt walrus, fox and seal. This was among the first 25 films selected by the Library of Congress for the U.S. National Film Registry as “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant.”