Voices from a distance: Sámi short film production in 2020

Abstract

The sudden outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic influenced many aspects of film production, which is especially visible in the example of local cinematographies. In this article, I investigate pandemic influence on depicting homeland, memory and locality in Sámi short films. The primary concern in the pre-2000 Sámi short films was the marginalization of Sámi culture, as well as tradition-modernization oppositions. However, in the productions from 2020, a switch into the discourse about the homeland and coping with pandemic in the far north is visible. In this article, I describe productions from 2020, dividing them into three thematic categories: films about the return to the homeland, films focusing on lockdown isolation and films based on genre conventions (such as comedy or horror), used for creating a discursive approach to pandemic. In the proposed article, I analyse Sámi films from the collection of International Sámi Film Institute, produced in Norway, Sweden or Finland.