Ten Canoes

Rolf de Heer and Peter Djigirr's 2006 film Ten Canoes is a playful piece of pastoral filmmaking. It's the first Australian film to be shot entirely in Indigenous languages (the Ganalbingu primarily) and every aspect of the production was assisted by Aboriginal guidance. Shot entirely on location in the Arafura Swamp of Arnhem Land, north of Darwin, near the village of Ramingining, Ten Canoes presents an introduction to one of Australia's ancestral Aboriginal legends. Two stories work hand in hand throughout: that of a modern day traditional hunt for the eggs of the magpie goose and that of an ancient legend concerning a brother who falls in love with the youngest of his older brother's three wives. Both stories combine to form a leisurely yet comprehensive geographical and cultural account of the people within Australia's Arnhem land. The light-hearted narrator's mirth complements the territory nicely, as we're introduced to a tribal way of life as told from their own points of view. We get to witness the construction of canoes, the collection of the magpie goose's eggs, and the creation of a campsite within waterlogged trees, built to avoid hungry crocodiles. Hopefully, the DVD contains a thirty-to-sixty minute making-of-feature that chronicles what it was like to film amidst such terrain; something akin to Les Blank's Burden of Dreams. Ten Canoes unravels like a comfortable tale quaintly woven at twilight in front of the coruscating waves of a quiescent campfire. Come for the story, stay for the legend, note how the characters chide one another about crocodiles, and enjoy the introduction to a traditional way of life.