Isuma & NITV: Igloolik, tell us your stories online

Atanarjuat The Fast Runner was a hit at the Cannes Film Festival, has been seen by 300,000 spectators in France, and acclaimed by audiences in Edinburgh, Toronto and Montreal. But ironically, few of Canada's indigenous population has seen the film.

The film was released in major cities, followed by DVD and Pay-TV distribution. This meant that remote fly-in Inuit and indigenous communities, with no 35mm cinemas and small populations, would be the very last people in Canada to see the first successful Inuit-language film ever made specifically for them!

This situation was a sad summary of 2 decades of action for Igloolik Isuma Productions and the Nunavut Independent Television Network (Igloolik). “If our primary cultural audience remains left behind, it seems futile to develop more independent indigenous filmmakers.”

On the basis of this finding, the Isuma and NITV solicited the support of the Canada Council to connect five isolated Inuit communities through the Internet and digital projectors.

A pilot version demonstrated the value of the approach. When The Journals of Knud Rasmussen was released, the network brought portable digital screening equipment to the school gyms and community halls of 80 isolated Aboriginal communities. These screenings - which temporarily revived the tradition of NFB travelling shows - brought together 18,000 people. They revived the sense of community that was the hallmark of earlier days, and allayed the isolation caused by television.

Now launched by Internet as http://www.isuma.tv/, hooking up the communities of Igloolik, Rankin Inlet and Pond Inlet (Nunavut), Puvirnituk and Inukjuaq (Nunavik), and other remote communities across Canada, the new network will reinforce this social dimension by presenting works by Inuit filmmakers to Inuit audiences.