'Let the river flow': Sami activism that doesn't break the ice

Driven by a Disney phenomenon like

Frozen,

the story of the Sami indigenous people began to permeate popular culture not so long ago.

Behind was a trail of silence and misfortune around a nomadic people, originally from northern Scandinavia, who lived off fishing and hunting and herding reindeer.

The story of this Lapland town is peppered with violence and racism.

In the 17th century, more than 300 Sami women were executed accused of witchcraft and their pagan religion, with an important cult of goddesses, was buried by the Christian one.

The songs to animals and nature were part of a society whose largest population nucleus resists today in Norway.

More information

The bleak future of the Sami in Finland: the victory of the right banishes their hopes for more self-government

Let the River Flow

opens an interesting door to the historical tragedy that surrounds this town, but its portrait of the awareness of a young Sami girl knows little.

The film, well-intentioned, does not fully grasp its historical context or its central issue: the intimate trauma and guilt of not wanting to be who you are.

The story and the point of view open up possibilities that Ole Giæver, director and screenwriter of this Norwegian-produced film, fails to channel, failing to give enough weight to a dramatic story marked by race complexes and the tragic fate of the Sami. .

Image of 'Let the river flow'

The story focuses on a young woman who randomly decides to embark on the fight to stop the construction of a hydroelectric plant on the Alta River, in Finnmark, a key place for the animal life of Lapland.

These events take us to the seventies and the awakening of a fearful and shy young teacher who is torn between the need to move forward and the call of her origins, marked from the first sequence by fatality.

Ole Giæver introduces a key character, an activist cousin, whose importance in the story does not quite find its place.

More information

Read all the movie reviews here

Let the river flow

points out ways, but flow does not flow, and finally it fails to go beyond the vindication of traditional Sami clothing, which is presented as a metaphor for the fears and complexes of a people that is the object of ridicule by the living. colors and ornaments of their clothing.

Unfortunately, the film misses those symbols and paradoxes of a history of Nordic racism.

let the river flow

Director:

Ole Giæver.

Performers:

Ivar Beddari, Bernt Bjørn, Maria Bock, Gard Emil Elvenes.

Genre:

drama.

Norway, 2023.

Platform:

Filmin.

Duration:

118 minutes. 

Premiere: February 9.

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