Three years after putting Nunavut on the filmmaking map with Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner, Zacharias Kunuk and Norman Cohn have started work on their follow-up with the similarly set The Journals of Knud Rasmusen. The pic is a history piece, set in 1920s Igloolik, about the culture clash between Europeans and the Inuit, as seen by a local shaman, his daughter, and the titular, real-life Danish explorer.

An 80/20 copro with Denmark, it is produced by Igloolik Isuma Productions, Kunuk Cohn Productions and Barok Film in Copenhagen, and expected to release in spring or summer 2006. Motion Picture Distribution LP will distribute in Canada while SF Film handles Scandinavia. Isuma Distribution International has the international rights.

As with Fast Runner, the movie is crewed mainly by people from Igloolik – a community some 800 kilometers northwest of Iqualuit, on one of the northernmost tips of the mainland. Kunuk and Cohn are directing from their own script, and producing along with Vibeke Vogel and Elise Lund Larsen of Barok. Natar Ungalaaq, star of Fast Runner, is also back along with Pakak Innukshuk and Peter-Henry Arnatsiaq.

The project is one of four that recently drew cash from Nunavut Film. Igloolik Isuma drew $155,000 for Journals and another $12,000 for its TV documentary Qallunajatut. Journals is also backed by Telefilm Canada, SODEC, CTF, the Nordic Film and TV Fund, and others.

Nunavut Film also gave $65,000 to Drum Song Communications for Kiviuq, a 90-minute folklore piece for APTN, and $50,000 to Inuit Communications Systems for its 6 x 30 doc Nunavut Elders Series.

Sheila Pokiak, newly hired CEO of Nunavut Film, notes that ’04/05 was a ‘tough year’ for the funder – it had budget and infrastructure problems, and had trouble communicating with area filmmakers – but is pledging to make improvements in the coming year. ‘I now have a more complete sense of my responsibilities,’ she says, ‘and am better able to assist Nunavut producers.’