White Wilderness (1958)

It’s been a while since we’ve had a good old-fashioned Disney controversy.  Sure, we’ve had films that aren’t exactly sensitive, but for the most part, they’ve gone under the radar.  This one?  Not so much.  Grab your parka and let’s find out just how some filmmakers will go to win an Oscar!

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We’ve known for a while that the True-Life Adventures aren’t always as true to life as they claim to be.  The Living Desert was largely filmed on a tabletop.  The prairie dogs in The Vanishing Prairie lived behind a pane of glass.  However, none of these little white lies compare to what filmmakers do to these poor lemmings in White Wilderness.  It’s the one thing anyone remembers from this movie, and it wasn’t exposed until 1982.  A Canadian documentary called Cruel Camera showed the world how the filmmakers really got that footage, and it’s not pretty.  I’ll go into detail later, but it’s really, really bad.  Not illegal back then, but definitely unethical and something that Walt would have been furious if he’d had a hand in the film past doling out paychecks.

Other than that, critical reception of White Wilderness was largely positive.  As they have with the previous True Life Adventures, critics and audiences were amazed by the beautiful color photography.  These feelings were intensified by the fact that few people had actually seen what the Arctic looked like at this point, so this was their first introduction to the ecosystem.  Critics also said that the music here was the most fitting and appropriate that it’s been yet, which worries me because that says to me that there will be less comic effect.  And of course, this movie won an Oscar for Best Documentary Feature.  But was it worth it?  Was it?

STORY

Epic, mysterious music heralds the penultimate arrival of our good buddy the magic paintbrush. It paints a portrait of the world when a quarter of it was covered with a massive glacier. Hibler explains how the glacier’s movements shaped the mountains and valleys of the world and the bodies and habits of the animals that lived in it. But for some, those adaptations weren’t enough. Wooly rhinoceri, mammoths, and mastodons, among others, are remembered only as cave paintings. An animated snow flurry transitions into a real snow flurry as we begin out second-to-last True Life Adventure in earnest. At this point, the general public knew very little about the Arctic, so Hibler is eager to share this mysterious world with us. Glaciers still exist there (or… they did in 1958…), and as spring warms the weather, bits of them melt away into the river. Stirring music plays as drop-by-drop, snowmelt turns into raging rivers. An actual river unfreezes and, as the water begins moving, the ice crust cracks and shatters into enormous boulders. My descriptions aren’t doing it justice. The images here are gorgeous.

The thaw connects the animals of the tundra to the open sea for a limited time only, so everybody has to hurry up and feed. A pod of walruses makes their way into the newly opened water as Hibler shares some interesting walrus trivia. Did you know they use their tusks for prying open shellfish? Or that their name is Scandinavian for “whale horse”? Well, now you do. They flop up out of the water to nap on the sun-warmed rocks and they are much less graceful but much more adorable. They’re so doofy looking. I love them. One of them tries to climb onto an iceberg since he can’t fit on the rock, but it tilts and plops him into the water. Silly walrus. And then there’s a lil fat baby walrus and he is ridiculous looking and it is just the best thing ever. He and his mama haul themselves out of the water to join their buds on the rocks. They even do what my sister calls “doggie ballet,” wiggling around on the ground to scratch an itch. It’s so cute. For the most part, they’re all chill with laying on each other and getting cozy but there’s one guy who wants all these walruses out of his bubble. A walrus fight ensues and it’s kind of scary with those big long teeth.

The fight quickly breaks up when something bigger and meaner than a territory dispute scares all the walruses into the water. It’s a polar bear, looking to pick on a baby walrus. The grown-up ones are too big and pointy for even a polar bear to mess with. He doesn’t bother to chase the walruses into the water, despite being capable of swimming across whole lakes. Too much trouble. Polar bears don’t hibernate, with the exception of pregnant females. We come to the den of one such female, who’s just given birth to two adorable floofy cubs without waking up. Actually, they’re not born floofy, but their floof has grown in so they have adequate protection from the cold and can head out and explore. They slide around snowdrifts and wrestle and play hide and seek and are generally the most adorable things ever. As an example of how intelligent bears are, we get to watch one cub toss snowballs onto his brother’s head. Three times. Silly babies. One of them also tries to indulge his natural instincts to climb trees using a hill instead. He slips and falls head over paws. Actually, this scene was staged by pushing the cub around a soundstage. It’s suspect but at least he’s not actually hurt like some of the other animals we see.

And then the best thing ever happens. Okay, it’s not quite as great as seeing turtles. But it’s close. Because… it’s BABY SEALS! And okay, I know there’s a TLA short all about seals but I couldn’t find that one so I’ll take what adorable pinniped action I can get. It’s a baby ringed seal, to be exact, and it’s adorable and white and fluffy to camouflage it against the snow. They don’t move very fast on land and they have no defenses, so they rely on not being seen. But it’s okay. He slides right down a snowbank and plops into a “pool of melted ice” that is an oddly bright shade of chlorine blue with something that looks suspiciously like a drain visible on the bottom. Once in the water, he’s much faster and more graceful, to the point that the polar bear cubs that look in to try to eat him can’t even get close.

For their part, the frustrated cubs go to get some hunting advice from their mama. On the way, they stop to antagonize some walruses. Common sense says a full-grown walrus could probably just sit on a polar bear cub and win but evolutionary fear soon has the walruses running scared. Mama Bear wakes up and goes to her cubs only to find that they’ve terrorized all the food. So she takes them off to search for something new. Our next creature is usually tricky to see because their watery home is usually frozen over. But Disney’s filmmakers were some of the first to capture footage of the beluga whale! They’re actually a species of small dolphin, and they’re very friendly. This movie would have you believe they’re dedicated synchronized swimmers. Silly True Life Adventures. They are very lovely and graceful under the ice. All this has been surprisingly enjoyable, and I’m starting to see why this is considered the best of the documentaries. Too bad they’re about to completely ruin it.

It’s lemming time.

Hibler starts out going on and on about the tragic legend of the lemmings and even says the myth isn’t entirely true. No. No, it’s not. Because you made it up. It starts off innocuously enough, though. Mama Lemming gets lost trying to find food for her babies, eventually getting stranded on an ice floe drifting out to see. She figures out that she’s stuck in a whirlpool and if she stays on the same piece of ice it’ll bring her back to shore. She gets back to her den and digs through the thin layer of unfrozen topsoil to her many, many babies. Spring thaws out the snow and causes water to leach through the top of the burrow. Once the snow is gone, though, the whole lemming colony comes out to eat the exposed vegetation. And there are thousands of them. A very confused snowshoe rabbit and an equally confused ptarmigan (a bird) look around at the horde getting underfoot. Imagine like a million hamsters just swarming all over the place. That’s what’s happening.

According to the film, every 7-10 years lemmings realize that a million of them is too many and they need to migrate to a place where food is more plentiful. “For reasons unknown” they all move together with no rhyme or reason. It’s certainly not because they’re being herded by human hands. Predators see the mass of lemmings as an all-you-can-eat buffet. The little guys have to contend with jagerbirds, ravens, and the truly adorable weasel-like ermine. The survivors press on and Hibler informs us that the lemmings aren’t afraid to swim rivers or lakes as long as they don’t stop. It’s grim, grim foreshadowing, because shortly they reach a cliff overlooking “the Arctic Sea.” Most of them jump off, and soon, the sea is dotted with dead lemmings as they grow exhausted and drown. It’s horrible. You know what’s even more horrible? I mean, I know I already spoiled the fact that this is all completely fabricated. But these lemmings were purchased from Inuit children, herded onto a turntable, then flung off a bridge into a river near downtown Calagry. Can you imagine being eight years old and a filmmaker you respect comes up to you and offers to put your pet hamster in their movie only to fling it off a bridge? Apparently, Walt wasn’t aware of any of this, but it’s still really, really messed up.

Once they’re done with the horrific animal cruelty, it’s back to our regularly scheduled nature documentary.  It’s not a True Life Adventure without a long segment about birds. There’s a king eiderduck strutting around showing off for the ladies, a turnstone… turning stones to look for food, and falloropes swimming around in circles to create a whirlpool to bring food to the surface. All these are species of ducks, by the way. Most of these ducks’ nests are on the ground because of course, trees and reeds are kinda hard to come by. An Arctic Gull keeps a sharp eye out for predators like the polar bear cubs currently menacing a loon. The loon isn’t having any of this, though, and he goes for the attackers’ eyes with his sharp beak. The cubs decide the loon isn’t worth the trouble and go off to find some eggs to munch on instead. Eggs don’t fight back. They’re not the only ones on the hunt for an omelet, though. The ermine is back, trying to figure out how to crack open an egg bigger than his head. Eventually, he pins it to a rock and chows down.

Then it’s back to the ducks because transitions are hard and stuff. Specifically, they’re goldeneye ducks, who, unusually, nest in trees. The ducklings have to leave the nest before they can fly which can prove problematic since they’re so high up. But they have a special adaptation that lets them stick the landing: they BOUNCE. Have you ever heard of anything better than bouncy ducklings? Because I haven’t. They all make it down in one bouncy little piece and follow Mama Duck to the lake. Grazing next to the water are another “living legend”, a description that made me instantly worry for these musk oxen. But no, they’re not about to hurl them off a bridge. They’re legendary because they’ve survived relatively unchanged since the Ice Age, thanks to their massive fluff and thick fat. They’ve also got some great defensive tactics, gathering into a circle when a predator approaches to point their horns at it.

The predator in question, a gray wolf, slinks off into the woods. Hibler tells us that, despite centuries of folklore villainizing them, wolves are actually very important keystone species and humans need to stop forcing them out of their habitats. One tries to jump into a tree and bounces right off. Because they’re big dumb doggos. We follow the wolves to their dens where we get to see lil baby wolf puppies playing with their mamas and papas! That’s right, wolves mate for life and Papa Wolves take good care of their puppies. It’s very cute. He teaches them to howl and hunt as a pack which means we get to listen to the lil baby wolves howling and aaah it’s so cute. The family makes their way to a mountain pass to ambush a herd of caribou on their migration north. They run at them until the weaker, sicker caribou are too exhausted to run and then it’s dinner time!

There’s one animal that can scare a wolf out of its hard earned kill, and it’s one that’s near and dear to my heart because they were my high school mascot. Wolverines might be tiny but they’re strong and vicious enough to take down a wolf or even a panther. In fact, they’re so dangerous that until this point hardly anyone had photographed one and lived to tell about it. It’s hard to take it seriously as a vicious predator as it bounces down the tundra but then another one comes up and the snarling that come out of them is chilling. A snowshoe rabbit hops up and the wolverine chases after it with a singlemindedness that lets you just know the rabbit is screwed. It tries to hide in a hollow log, but the wolverine just knocks it down a hill into the lake. The rabbit gets away in the nick of time but escapes right into the hungry beak of a raven. The wolverine targets the raven but ends up getting tricked into climbing a tree and falling when the raven flies away. It’s not a good day for the wolverine. Then he spots an osprey nest containing a chick that’s too young to fly. The mother osprey tries her hardest but the wolverine hangs onto the tree branch in spite of her slashing talons. When he reaches the top of the tree… no more baby osprey.

Spring ends and the tundra refreezes into an icy wasteland. But of course, the cycle of life goes ever on. Polar bears keep hunting on the ice floes. Their cubs keep playing, even continuing to dump snow on each others’ heads. Walruses and belugas still glide through the oceans. The caribou and reindeer migrate back south, but they’ll be back, as will the wolves stalking them. These big dumb doggos slide around the ice but they’re determined. If they don’t get to the warmer forests before the blizzards start, they’ll all freeze to death. Luckily, the caribou and the wolves both make it just in time. Once they cross the finish line, the blizzards immediately start. I guess it’s hard to have a forest fire in the Arctic so this is the next best thing. Gotta have that dramatic natural disaster ending. The whole screen whites out. When the swirling snow clears, the sun sets to signal the beginning of the endless night of the Arctic winter. Life, as always, will continue on. Until global warming ends it all.

I actually really liked this one. And I hate that I really liked this one.  The music was well matched to the scenery, though it more resembled a live-action Fantasia than The Living Desert’s comedy pieces. There were dozens of adorable baby animals, and baby seals make everything better. This movie’s got so many virtues that it makes that one unforgivable scene all the more painful.  There was a lot to really like. But I just… I can’t. Those poor, poor lemmings.

MUSIC

As I mentioned, I was a little concerned when I read the critcs praising the use of music.  They lambasted Living Desert for its irreverence when I found its music the most entertaining of all.  However, as I just said, my worries were unfounded.  They used music differently to underscore the animals’ stories, but different isn’t a bad thing.  The orchestral piece that played over the moving glaciers was big and epic and grand and a perfect beginning for the story of a place that, at the time, was still mysterious and exotic.   The belly dancing tune that played when the walruses were itching themselves made me smile, and the whale ballet helped emphasize how graceful the whales were.  It’s a big reason why this True Life Adventure was more successful than the rest.

ARTISTRY

White Wilderness was filmed over a period of three years in Manitoba and Alberta, Canada. As I’ve said this was the first time a lot of people had seen this region and the filmmakers did a wonderful job of making it look like a magical wonderland. There’s not a lot of color to work with in this desolate landscape, but they made a little go a long way. The water and scant vegetation really pop (to the point where I’m seriously questioning whether that was actually the sea. The seal is definitely in a pool). The opening with the glaciers moving is a marvel.

FINAL THOUGHTS

I don’t feel right rating this movie as high as I want to.  What’s good is really, really good.  The nature photography is exquisite, the variety of animals is delightful, and the music works better than any True Life Adventure so far.  All that together puts this one up towards an 8 or a 9… if it weren’t for the lemmings.  How anyone could greenlight something like that is beyond me.  There is nothing ethical or moral about that and I can’t fathom how none of the studio execs put a stop to it even if Walt and Roy were otherwise engaged.  Such a thing was legal at the time, but frowned upon, especially the part where these were kids’ pets and you are throwing them off a bridge.  And for what?  So you could build a dramatic story on the back of animal bones?  If you’re doing a series called True Life Adventures, at least attempt to tell true-life stories.  Emphasis on life.

Favorite scene: BABY SEALS.

Final rating: 5/10.  Like I said, the vast majority of this movie deserves a much higher rating.  I just can’t in good conscious give it one given what went on in the making of it.  It feels too much like supporting that stuff.

Does getting this one done in a day and a half make up for The Light in the Forest getting delayed?