Far North
Posted By Lonesome Loser on March 4, 2009
*SPOILER WARNING: All film discussions may include information that would spoil the ending for viewers who have not yet seen the film.
Far North (2008) is a sparse film, with only three real characters and not a lot of dialogue. Still, I found it arresting and disturbing, with unrequited love as a major theme in the story. It takes place in the northern reaches of Alaska or perhaps Russia, it’s not clear. The time period is also not clear, but seems to be sometime in the first half of the twentieth century. Savia (Michelle Yeoh) is a woman native to the area who has lived outside of human culture for most of her life. She was found to be cursed at birth by the tribal shaman, who she would bring harm to anyone foolish enough to get close to her. Savia’s mother was told to abandon her. Instead, mother raised Savia on her own on the outskirts of the community, but the others forced Savia to leave once she became of age and her mother could no longer protect her.
Savia then spent many years alone, on the outskirts of any village or hunting party, not participating, uninvited. A man took interest in her and invited her to join them hunting. However, this man and his entire tribe were soon all killed by Russian soldiers looking to lay claim to the land. Savia found a surviving female infant and took the baby to raise. The baby grew into a lovely adult woman called Anja (Michelle Krusiec). Savia is out on the ice and finds a man, abandoned and near death. She takes pity on him and breaks her usual policy of not helping strangers. The man, Loki (Sean Bean), stays with Savia and Anja for a while.
Unrequited love ends in murder. Savia falls in love with Loki, who in turn falls in love with Anja, a classic love triangle. Loki and Anja tell Savia they will be leaving her to start a family with other people around. Once their leaving sinks in and becomes more real, Savia reacts with horrifying deliberation. She strangles Anja, the child she raised from infancy, slices off Anja’s face and wears it as a mask over her own (a la shades of Hannibal Lecter). She puts on Anja’s clothing and pretends to be her when Loki returns from the hunt. They begin to make love, and Savia tells Loki she loves him, prompting him to look closer and realize this is not Anja. Loki runs screaming with horror from their tented dwelling as Savia slides Anja’s face off her own. Loki runs naked into the frozen wasteland. The last of Savia’s humanity fades from her heart as the last of the fire fades in her home.
This film was truly disturbing to me, on a kind of primitive or primal level. Savia was in love with Loki, and he might have fallen in love with her in return but because there is the younger woman Anja, he of course chooses the younger woman who can bear children, who is relatively innocent, who is able to look up to him. There is a moment where Loki and Savia were becoming emotionally close. She tries to tell him about herself, but Anja comes in and garners Loki’s attention with her youth and untroubled soul. This seemed to be the tipping point in the triangle, the point at which Loki, who had been precariously balanced between the two women, tipped toward Anja.
It seemed to me that Loki and Anja did not see the danger inherent in the situation, despite clues to the contrary. There are hints of violence in Savia’s being and worldview all along, such as her curse of harming all who she is close to, and how she repeatedly told Anja that if you find someone on the ice, you must first cut off their head and then ask if they need help. She sees others as dangerous disruptions to her world. The last man who she became close to ended up dead shortly thereafter. Loki may remind Savia of her dead lover. Certainly a large part of the reason why Savia broke her own rule and rescued Loki was because she is lonely and nourishes a half-conscious hope that she might keep Loki for her own. She is so devastated at the double loss and betrayal of Anja and Loki that she commits the ultimate crime in the name of love, taking the life of her companion/child and taking on her persona in a horrifyingly literal way just to be with Loki. We can understand Savia’s motivation to be her unrequited love for Loki, but her murdering of Anja seems to come from a cold, isolated place where no warm thing can survive. If she had family and friends to help her absorb the blow, to try and make sense of it, perhaps she would not have become so lost. But it seems Savia has lived too long without others, her morality is alien or primitive if not beyond understanding, then certainly beyond sympathy. Violence, betrayal, darkness, ice, all in the bitter service of unrequited love.
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