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A True Story of an Artic Adventure.


Director Philip Kaufman took his production of Eskimo life to actual locations in the Arctic Circle, making it only the third film in history (after Nanook of the North and Eskimo) to shoot there. Kaufman also employs authentic Eskimo dialect in the film, which adds a heightened bit of realism. The story concerns three whalers -- Billy (Warren Oates), Daggett (Timothy Bottoms), and Portagee (Louis Gossett Jr.) -- who becomes stranded in the Arctic Circle and are rescued by a tribe of Eskimos. Living in the Eskimo village, the three men introduce the chief vices of their civilization -- gambling, thievery, and Western-style sex -- to the isolated Eskimo village. At first the natives put up with the behavior of the Westerners, but as their ways begin to encroach upon the traditional Eskimo customs, the villagers begin to resist the three men's habits. A clash of cultures results.

The White Dawn is a Canadian film, released in 1974, and directed by Philip Kaufman and stars Warren Oates, Timothy Bottoms, and Louis Gossett, Jr. It portrays the conflict between aboriginal peoples' traditional way of life and Europeans' eagerness to take advantage of them. The film employs authentic Inuit dialect, which adds to the overall realism of the film. It is based on the 1971 novel, The White Dawn: An Eskimo Saga, by James Archibald Houston, who co-wrote the screenplay.

Release Date: July 21, 1974 @ Loews Tower East, NYC

Distrib: Paramount