"Tabu" - F. W. Murnau (1931)

F. W. Murnau, perhaps the greatest German Expressionist filmmaker, shifted to Hollywood in 1927 at the invitation of producer William Fox and closed out his too-brief career there.   Prior to his tragic death in 1931, he made two classics there that stand as monuments to the wondrous visual possibilities of silent films – Sunrise (1927) and Tabu (aka Tabu: A Story of the South Seas, 1931).  Although Sunrise is generally considered to be Murnau’s masterpiece, Tabu has also always been highly regarded [1,2,3], and indeed filmmaker Eric Rohmer is said to have labelled Murnau as cinema's greatest filmmaker and Tabu his greatest film [4,5].

Both of these films are about love that is threatened by dark forces, but the natures of those dark forces are different. In Sunrise” the threatening forces come from within – the dark almost uncontrollable passions of lust and revenge inside the male protagonist (“The Man” in that film).  In Tabu the threatening force is external to the protagonists.  Despite this distinction between the internal and external natures of the threats, both of the threats have a generic quality that makes them understandable to everyone.

The production of Tabu was begun as an artistic collaboration between Murnau and Robert J. Flaherty a pioneer in documentary ethnographic narratives (e.g. Nanook of the North (1922) and Moana (1926)), and the two of them co-wrote the screenplay for their film.  However, as location shooting commenced in Tahiti, artistic and personal differences arose between Flaherty and Murnau, led to Flaherty’s eventual withdrawal from the production.  Nevertheless, when the film is viewed today, it can be seen to bear the aesthetic earmarks of both of these artists, particularly with respect to the opening sequences of Tabu, which were shot by Flaherty. 

To economize on production costs for the film shooting in Tahiti, Murnau used mostly local actors and a local production crew.  This being a silent film, it is told entirely without dialogue, although some diegetically-internal written textual messages appear that convey important information for the storyline.  In addition the music composed by Hugo Riesenfeld is synchronised with the visuals and sometimes features sounds and tones that have diegetic relevance.

The story of Tabu concerns the love between two Polynesian natives in the South Seas some time ago and how their love is interfered with by external social forces.  It is partitioned into two parts, “Paradise” and “Paradise Lost”; but I would say that the narrative roughly comprises four divisions.

1.  Paradise
The film opens with young men on the small Pacific island of Bora Bora joyfully engaged in their native practice of spear-fishing.  One of the men, Matahi, seems to be particularly adept in this activity. They later frolic in the nearby waterfalls associated with a local stream, where they encounter some young women bathing together.  When Matahi breaks up a fight that suddenly arose between two of the girls, he finds himself comforting one of the two combatants, Reri (played by Anne Chevalier), who was getting the worst of it. It soon becomes evident that Matahi and Reri are naturally attracted to each other.

The entire picture here in this first section is that of innocent “noble savages” living joyfully and harmoniously in a pristine natural environment.

2.  A Dark Spectre Comes
The happy revelry of these young people is interrupted by the exciting appearance of a sailing ship that arrives at Bora Bora.  Onboard the ship is a stern old warrior, Hitu, who bears a message from the ruling chief of Fanuma. The message declares that the woman who was their tribal Sacred Virgin has just died, and that this high and honourable position is now to be filled by a resident of Bora Bora, Reri.  But this position comes with a high price – the Sacred Virgin, who is supposed to epitomise and symbolise virtue, dignity, and honour, must be kept eternally away from the possible lustful gazes of men.  In other words, she is to become a prisoner sacrificed to the superstitions surrounding the artificial notions of objective dignity and honour. 

While the locals rejoice in the appointment, Reri weeps.  But at a local festival celebrating the event, Reri has the opportunity to dance, and she and Matahi seize the brief opportunity to dance seductively together.  Afterwards Hitu takes Reri onboard the ship for a lifetime of incarceration.

However, at night Matahi sneaks out to the not-yet-departed ship and secretly absconds with Reri.  The locals then propose a willing substitute for Reri, but Hitu remains implacable.  He will settle for noone other than Reri.

Hitu’s never-changing dour expression of inexorable demand makes him a symbol of annihilation.  He is the Grim Reaper.  This casts the rest of the film as a contest between human love and death itself.

3.  Matahi and Reri Together    
Almost starved, Matahi and Reri manage to get away and make it to another island in French Polynesia, where the attraction of the pearl trade has led to a greater presence of Western civilization.  This offers the young couple the opportunity of possible escape from the restrictions of their superstitious tribal society.  But it also introduces new complications.

The athletic Matahi quickly establishes himself as an expert peal diver.  But his ignorance of how money works leads him to assume an enormous debt at the conclusion of a party he threw for his new island community which featured heaps of expensive champagne.

And when a ship arrives at their new island, it is revealed that, in order to reduce local tensions, the French colonial authorities are seeking the return of Matahi and Reri to Bora Bora.  The two of them just manage to escape capture when Matahi bribes the arresting French constable with a pearl he still has.  Hitu’s grim, implacable image seems always to be lurking around every corner, though.  He tracks them down and surreptitiously leaves a warning message for Reri: she must surrender herself to Hitu within three days, or Matahi will be killed.

Reri hides Hitu’s message from her beloved and now seeks for them to escape to the more cosmopolitan port of Papeete.  But they are blocked from buying tickets by Matahi’s unpaid debt.

4.  Closing In  
The relentless spectre, Hitu, returns to their hut at night and is about to kill the sleeping Matahi when Reri implores him to desist.  She promises to go with Hitu later in order to save Matahi’s life. The Grim Reaper, Hitu, then leaves her with Matahi still asleep.

At this point the narrative switches to parallel action. Matahi, who still doesn’t know about Hitu’s immanent presence, wakes up and now realizing the monetary value of pearls, goes off to a dangerous lagoon guarded by a man-eating shark (and therefor declared "tabu" by the authorities) in order to hunt for a big pearl that can secure their escape.  Meanwhile Reri, ready to depart, writes a tear-stained note to her beloved:

“I have been so happy with you for more than I deserved.

The love you have given me I will keep to the last beat of my heart.

Across the great waters I will come to you in your dreams, when the moon spreads its  path on the sea.

Farewell”

Off in the lagoon, Matahi just manages to secure his desired large pearl before the man-eating shark can get him.  But when he triumphantly returns to their hut, he sees Reri missing and Hitu sailing in a small boat out to sea.  Knowing that Hitu has kidnapped Reri, Matahi desperately swims out after them.  He almost catches up with Hitu, but exhaustion finally overcomes him.  He drowns in the sea as the film ends.


Despite its naturalistic setting and performing troupe, Tabu features both romantic (contributed to by Flaherty) and expressionistic (from Murnau) elements that go beyond the naturalistic.  And, in particular, it is Murnau’s expressionist flavour that resonates with the viewer.  This is the story of innocent and sincere love that is, like Romeo and Juliet, unjustly obstructed by traditional prejudices.  And the modernist influences from French colonialism only becloud things for our protagonists.  Western economic notions of monetary expenses and accumulated debt are only entanglements for these innocents, and French colonial policies of laissez-faire left the two of them unprotected from harsh and backward superstitious practices.

Murnau presents these social menaces as embodied in the almost demonic form of Hitu, who looms over the story like a dark shadow.  I have characterized Murnau’s Sunrise as actually a horror film, due to its expressionistic rendering of destructive passions.  And on the surface, Tabu may at first seem quite different.  Here we have two lovers who are the essence of innocence.  What threatens them is external to them and entirely beyond their comprehension.  But Hitu is not just some individual external menace; he seems to embody the dark side of life itself, i.e. death. For our two innocent lovers there seems to be no escape from his relentless pursuit.  Again we have a horror show, but this time painted by Murnau on a naturalistic canvas.
★★★★

Notes:

1. Mordaunt Hall, ”THE SCREEN; Mr. Marnau's Last Picture”, The New York Times,  (19 March 1931).  
2. Dennis Schwartz, "Brilliantly simple lyrical  film was shot on location in Tahiti", Ozus' World Movie Reviews, (17 March 2013).    
3. Jeffrey M. Anderson, “Tabu (1931)”, Combustible Celluloid, (n.d.).      
4. Gordon Thomas, “Bright Sights: Recent DVDs: Tabu; French Masterworks: Russian Émigrés in Paris, 1923-1928", Bright Lights Film Journal, (31 July 2013).    
5. Dennis Grunes, “TABU (Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau, 1931)”, Dennis Grunes, (14 February 2008). 

“Nanook of the North” - Robert Flaherty (1922)

Documentary films cover a vast range of subject matter, and the history of documentary films  is filled with masterpieces across this range, making them difficult to compare and rank.  And yet this history has one landmark film that makes it stand out among the others – Nanook of the North (1922).  Not only was this film probably the first feature-length documentary, it may still be the greatest documentary film ever made.

Certainly the making of this film about Eskimos in upper Canada must have been an extraordinary effort, and anyone who sees the film can’t help wondering how it was even done under what must have been severe shooting conditions of that environment.  Writer-director Robert Flaherty (1884-1951) was initially an explorer and prospector working in upper Canada and was at that time only a novice filmmaker.  In 1913 he had shot some film of the Inuit people (Eskimos of Quebec’s Nunavik region), but his negatives were subsequently lost in an editing-room fire.  It took him some years to get the financial backing to return to the area and make a new film, this time with a more clear idea of what his narrative should be. 

In fact Flaherty’s injection of narrative, which was facilitated by his showing developed film rushes to his Inuit subjects in order to get suggestions concerning how to accentuate the developing narrative, was both stylistically groundbreaking and controversial.  Many people over the years have criticized the film’s authenticity and have complained about artificially staged scenes in the film [1,2,3,4].  I will discuss briefly those criticisms below, but I do feel that the liberties taken by Flaherty on this occasion were well justified.  What Flaherty produced was more than an ethnographic account of some remote aboriginals; it was a poetic and universal tale about man’s struggle to be.  Indeed the movie’s subtitle was A Story of Life and Love in the Actual Arctic.

The story of the film passes through five phases or acts, each of which depicts a struggle within an increasingly threatening environment.  This gives the film a melancholy flavor that highlights the main character Nanook’s intrepid determination to continue with life in “The North”.  Throughout these scenes there is shown the contrast between the harsh environmental circumstances and the positive spirit of Flaherty’s subjects:

“The most cheerful people in all the world – the fearless, lovable, happy-go-lucky Eskimo.”

This is highlighted by many editing cutaways showing Nanook’s children playing in the snow and his wives happily attending to their offspring and their chores.

1.  Introducing Nanook
In the opening sequences the Eskimo Allakariallak, who is known as “Nanook” (an honorific meaning a great polar bear but signifying a great hunter), is shown situated in his northern region, where only about 300 people live in an area the size of England.  These people live entirely off the wild animals in the area, which they kill for food, for their skins and furs, and for other elements of the animals' bodies.  Nanook travels by sled with his two wives and several young children to a coastal “white man’s” trading post where he swaps the furs he has obtained from his hunting for needed commodities.  This includes the furs from seven polar bears he has slain with his harpoon over the past year.  There is a famous scene of the trader showing Nanook a recently acquired novelty – a phonograph record player, which amazes the delighted Nanook.

2.  Nanook’s Hunting

Because of an iceberg blockage along the coast, normal fishing is blocked, and Nanook is forced to dart over the ice floes in order spearfish some salmon.  Later he and some mates learn of some walruses that have been spotted, and they go to hunt them.  Since a walrus weighs almost two tons, to kill one of them is a super haul.  Nanook and his companions do manage to harpoon one walrus that was snoozing on the shore, and then they all struggle to pull the frantic beast ashore as it tries to swim away.

Then the harsh winter sets in with its cold weather and brief hours of daylight.  Nanook goes looking for seals.  Along the way Nanook captures an arctic (white) fox.  Although the fox’s white fur means the animal is doomed, Flaherty has some shots here of Nanook’s son briefly playing with the animal.

3.  Camping

Since the family’s winter hunting expedition has entailed a long arduous journey over the snow-covered terrain, they need to camp somewhere.  So Nanook sets about quickly constructing an igloo out of the packed snow. It includes a window made of ice that enables them to see out side without subjecting them to cold drafts.  This is a famously fascinating scene, and it further depicts the cheerful industriousness of Nanook in the wild.  Even the husky puppies that are part of their family have their own little igloo built for them to protect them at night from the savagery of the older huskies that pull the family sled.  And while the amazingly resourceful father works on the igloo, the children are shown in cutaways playing in the snow.

In the morning one of Nanook’s wives, Nyla, is shown giving her infant an "Eskimo kiss" with her nose.  This was probably one of the first widely spread images of this famous custom. 
 

4. Seal Hunt
They are still searching for seals, and Nanook knows that the seals swimming under the frozen water need to come up and breathe air every twenty minutes.  So he looks for any small air holes in the ice that seals maintain for breathing.  He finally finds one tiny hole, and manages to hook  a submerged seal with his harpoon.  There then ensues a lengthy tug-of-war between Nanook and the massive seal that lasts 3:20 of screen time.  Finally, with his family’s help, Nanook hauls up the seal, and the hungry family immediately begin slaughtering it.  But their semi-savage dogs are hungry, too, and they become more snarlingly wild at the sight of the available flesh.  In fact the dogs are so ravenous over the few scraps of meet they are given that they start attacking each other.  This extended dogfight, we are told, dangerously delays the family’s progress toward shelter.

5.  The Journey
Now the family is just trying to find shelter as darkness falls and a threatening, windy snow storm arises.  They finally find an abandoned igloo and settle in for the night.  Far away from the safety of home and with the swirling snowstorm outside, Nanook and his family try to get some sleep as the film ends.  The final intertitle reads,

“The shrill piping of the wind, the rasp and hiss of driving snow, the mournful wolf howls of Nanook’s master dog typify the melancholy spirit of the North.”

Throughout Nanook of the North, things have been getting progressively darker and more threatening for our spirited and dauntless protagonists.  It is even more somber when we reflect on the fact that the real Allakariallak died shortly after the film was released, reportedly starving to death while out hunting for deer.  We see a picture of a grim, heartless world through which our intrepid hero is trying to make his lonely way.

Flaherty effectively colors this scheme by often cutting away to images of the husky dogs that Nanook owns.  They are his companions, but they are also brutish and mysteriously “other”.  They represent the other, ultimately untamable aspect of nature, and their constant, contrasting  presence was a crucial part of Flaherty’s art.

Some people, though, have criticized Flaherty for his creativity and deviation from pure ethnographic objectivity [1,2,3,4]. For example,

• Nanook’s family in the film was not his real family but were Inuits who were cast by Flaherty to play their roles.
• Inuits were already using rifles for hunting in those days, but Flaherty wanted them to eschew such recent technology in the film and stick to their traditional hunting methods.
• In order to film the interiors of the igloos, Flaherty had a part of the wall removed so that he could have camera room and adequate lighting.
• Several events were staged; for example the seal hunt tug-of-war in Act 4 was artificially staged with offscreen assistance.

However, I believe that all of these creative decisions on the part of Flaherty were sound, and I am in agreement with Roger Ebert that they contributed to a higher level of narrative authenticity of the tale [5].  In this connection esteemed film critic Andrew Sarris, who ranked Flaherty in his "pantheon" of great film directors, commented [6] –

"One of the most beautiful moments in the history of the cinema was recorded when Nanook smilingly acknowledged the presence of Flaherty's camera in his igloo.  The director was not spying on Nanook or attempting to capture his life in the raw.  He was collaborating with Nanook on a representation rather than a simulation of existence."

The key thing about a film, whether fictional or documentary, is the degree to which it embodies a compelling and authentic visual narrative. That ultimate authenticity is there, in my opinion.

Flaherty used a number of cinematic techniques to achieve just that.  His use of parallel action showing Nanook’s kids being allowed to play while their parents toiled managed to cast a human, but still realistic, light on the family’s upbeat bearing towards a difficult world.  And Flaherty’s frequent use of cutaways to show storms and the desolate landscape were aesthetic gestures that helped establish and maintain the mood of lonely struggle in a hostile world.

But it was Flaherty’s orchestration of the grim counterpoint between the cheerily resourceful Nanook, the inhospitable environment, and the carnality of the dogs that make this film a work of art.
★★★★

Notes:

1.  Dean W. Duncan, “Nanook of the North”, The Criterion Collection (11 January 1999).   
2. “Nanook of the North”, Wikipedia, (5 May 2017).    
3. “Robert J. Flaherty”, Wikipedia, (23 February 2017).   
4. J. E. de Cockborne, “Nanook of the North (1922)”, A Cinema History, (October 2015).  
5. Roger Ebert, “Nanook of the North”, Great Movie, RogerEbert.com, (25 September 2005).  
6. Andrew Sarris, The American Cinema: Directors and Directions, 1929-1968, E. P. Dutton & Co. (1968), pp. 42-43.