These two short films appear with Edge of the Knife on Severin’s All the Haunts Be Ours Vol. 2 set.

Haida Carver (1964): On Canada’s Pacific coast, director Richard Gilbert shot this short film about young Haida artist, Robert Davidson, and shows how he shapes miniature totems from argillite, a jet-like stone.

While many of the Haida people his age have given up carving for fishing, which isn’t as time consuming and pays better, very few artists were left when this was made. We get to see how Robert finds stones and how he learned from his grandfather how to do this traditional art.

Davidson’s Haida name is G̲uud San Glans, which means “Eagle of the Dawn,” and he remains a leading figure in the renaissance of Haida art and culture. He said, “If we look at the world in the form of a circle, let us look at what is on the inside of the circle as experience, culture and knowledge: Let us look at this as the past. What is outside of the circle is yet to be experienced. But in order to expand the circle we must know what is inside the circle.”

Nalujuk Night (2021): Nalujuk Night is a tradition among the Inuit of Nunatsiavut, an annual event in which “startling figures that come from the Eastern sea ice, dressed in torn and tattered clothing, animal skins and furs” walk through the town, where they reward good children and chase the bad.

Directed by Jennie Williams, this was part of the National Film Board of Canada’s Labrador Documentary Project, which seeks to foster the creation of documentary films about Inuit culture from an Inuit perspective.

Set on January 6, this holiday is celebrated by the young and old alike. In a university paper, Jannelle Barbour wrote: “Nalujuks are not real. They are like the boogey-men of other cultures. But, where this event takes place every year, everyone takes the Nalujuks to be a real thing. Most children and some adults are deathly afraid of them.”

She goes on to say, “Nalujuk’s night is truly a very exciting and scary time for all youth. The night starts off down to the community hall, where there are four or five people dressed as Nalujuks. These Nalujuks aren’t the ones that actually chase the children around town, trying to hit them. These Nalujuks are just there to show the younger children…what a Nalujuk is. After everyone leaves the hall, the real fun and games begin. Usually there are a lot of Nalajuks out running around, and there is always this one big and scary one, this one usually has the biggest weapon. It is really scary to get caught by this one. In Nain, there is always one spot where all the kids gather to stay safe. It’s usually on the steps of a person’s house. No one seems to mind though, seeing that this only happens once a year.”

I would never know of this event without Severin’s box set.

These short films are part of the new Severin box set, All the Haunts Be Ours Volume 2.

You can order this set from Severin.