''The Tundra Book'' – a document of a life slowly disappearing

The 9th ZagrebDox International Competition will screen the Russian documentary film The Tundra Book. A Tale of Vukvukai, the Little Rock, directed by Alexei Vakhrushev. This award-winning film brings a story of nomads breeding herds of reindeer in the tundra wilderness of Chukotka Peninsula in the far east of Russia. Their lifestyle, marked by harsh weather conditions and constant struggle, is on the brink of extinction. We meet Vukvukai, who has lived in the Chukotka mainland for 72 years now. He is an old man full of energy and wisdom – the real tundra hero whose life was marked by reindeer. The TRAILER is accompanied by this brief director’s comment:

This is a film about an ancient culture and a unique world of the Chukchi reindeer breeders which still alive in deep and wild Tundra of Chukotka peninsula. That world and culture have been living under hard pressure from inside and outside long years. The question: To be or not to be?- isn’t a hypothesis. That’s reality. Their customs are vanishing. Their lifestyle is living under the threat of disappearance. We attempted to fixed and safe that world in our Documentary. We gave Chukchi reindeer breeders a chance to show their real life and to speak about their past and the present, to speak openly with a heavy heart. Alexei Vakhrushev
 

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