Being Caribou
February 2008 Reviewed by: Charlotte Meyer Format: DVD	(all ratings out of 5): Overall Enjoyment Picture Quality Packaged Extras Sound Quality

An amazing little documentary, this. It tells the story of a young Canadian couple, newlyweds, who trek across the Yukon following a herd of 120,000 caribou on their migration to their calving grounds in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The caribou cross huge mountain ranges and 40 rivers. Following them the whole way are Karsten Heuer, a park warden, and Leanne Allison, a filmmaker, who carry all their gear and food and camera equipment on their backs. They come as close to "being caribou" as anyone could, withstanding all the trials caribou do, climbing through deep snow up steep mountainsides, facing blizzard winds, swimming raging rivers, waiting out lurking bears, suffering chronic hunger and fatigue, and, perhaps most unexpected, enduring the maddening swarm of spring insects.

Allison and Heuer set out on April 8 from a tiny Gwich’in village in the Yukon and return to it September 8 -- five months in all documenting the caribou life cycle: spring migration, calving, post-calving aggregation, and the fall dispersal. Their photography is magnificent. From a mountain cliff, they catch vast vistas of thousands of caribou moving below like a branching river. Arriving at the Refuge, they show us a small new calf wild with its own energy running breakneck among the grazing cows. We hear loons calling, caribou bleating, eagles shrieking, and the menacing thrum of a billion mosquitoes. How they managed, with just the two of them, to capture it all -- and to carry all the equipment -- is a wonder of its own.

Included are clips of the two Presidents Bush making fun of those who cherish the caribou or the landscape of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. To let him "see for himself," Heuer carries along a small George W. Bush doll, in incongruous suit and tie. The camera catches it at incongruous moments. When the two of them are amidst hundreds of calving caribou cows, silently hunkered down in their tent, Allison whispers, "I can’t believe this is the exact spot where they want to drill for oil." Cut to Bush-doll poking out of tent roof, turning right and left, as if being made to take a good look. This is the very point of the film -- to give us all a good look at what is at stake in preserving the ANWR.

It’s easy to imagine the crowds at the indie festivals roaring at that scene. The film has won 17 awards in all, including "festival favorite" awards, and certainly for more than these comic moments. It is a beautifully made film. The editing is excellent: the complex sequence of the migration unfolds coherently and the superb nature photography is integrated smoothly. The simple score, using original Gwich’in music, is appropriate and unobtrusive. In order to keep the focus on the caribou, the relationship between the newlywed trekkers is left understated, a restraint unlikely in American films.

Without scolding or preaching, the purpose of the film is clear. At the end, the couple leaves the Yukon for interviews at the Senate and House in Washington. But as Heuer says, it was pouring out his heartfelt story only to have it hit a blank wall. We have to start from the bottom up instead, he concludes. And so this DVD came into my hands, off a website, free of charge, with the request that I share it. And so I have, with you. Slowly the film is finding an audience. It’s no longer free, but you can get it at www.beingcaribou.com, and when you do, pass it on!

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