Greenland’s “Walls-akinni inuk” makes its world premiere Friday at Denmark’s CPH:DOX documentary festival, amid a heated political debate on the future of the Arctic island. While Denmark is fighting off President Donald Trump’s takeover efforts, and Greenland’s fresh elections has reinforced its claim for independence, the film delivers a timely message of reconciliation and understanding, through the voices of its co-directors, the Dane Sofie Rørdam and Greenlandic Nina Paninnguaq Skydsbjerg.
“It’s very strange for us to have the film come out under such tense political circumstances,” says Rørdam to Variety ahead of the film’s debut in the NORDIC:DOX competition. “Of course, we want our film to be an opportunity to discuss Greenland and its relationship with Denmark; there is a lot of Danish colonial arrogance at the moment, but with our film, we are raising specific questions – such as the need to look into the Greenlandic prison system under Danish control – through a human story.”
“In Greenlandic, the title of the film ‘akinni inuk’ means ‘the human being in front of me,’ ” explains Paninnguaq Skydsbjerg. “I want this film to remind audiences how much they can do just by being curious of the person in front of them.”
“With today’s media attention on Greenland,” she adds, “I’m almost afraid to do interviews as people try to make the film into something it is not, to serve their own purpose. But I want this film to be seen for what it is: a story about love, friendship, and how human connection can wash away all prejudice.”
Produced by high-profile Greenlandic/Danish Emile Hertling Péronard, credited for the 2023 Oscar-nominated short film “Ivalu” and CPH:DOX opener “Twice Colonized,” “Walls-akinni inuk” kickstarts as a documentary about Greenland’s prison system, but gradually evolves into a gripping tale of unlikely friendship between Paninnguaq Skydsbjerg and detainee Ruth Mikaelsen Jerimiassen. Although everything seemingly differentiates the two women – one is a successful career-driven film producer/filmmaker, and the other a broken woman serving an indefinite detention sentence for attempted murder – both discover through numerous and lengthy conversations behind prison walls, that they share a history of trauma and sexual abuse. When Ruth’s case is reopened, she and Paninnguaq Skydsbjerg are given an opportunity for redemption.
Beautifully shot by the filmmakers with cinematographers Anders Berthelsen and Inuk Silis Høegh, the intimate prison scenes alternate with poetic views of Greenland’s breath-taking landscape, through the wise editing of Bille August regular collaborator Biel Andrés (“The Kiss,” “The Count of Monte Cristo”) and Nanna Frank Møller (“The Sky Above Zenica,” “Ambulance”).
Going back to the genesis of the film, Rørdam says in 2015, when her father was living and working in Greenland as a biologist, she grabbed the opportunity to explore the local prison system, after having investigated a similar topic in Asia. Fascinated by the island’s system based on the social rehabilitation of inmates, she gained access to a correctional facility and started filming in 2017, providing prisoners as well – including Ruth – a chance to record their daily routines with small cameras. “When I got the recordings back, I was hugely impressed. This is when I contacted Emile [Hertling Péronard] and asked him if I could team up with a local producer.”
The latter – Greenlandic from his mother’s side and Danish from his father’s – remembers when Rørdam first approached him and how the film started to take shape. “At the time, I couldn’t be part of it, but suggested Nina as producer while I followed them on the sidelines. Nina and Sofie thought they would do a quick film, but circumstances changed the fate of the film. the cameras given to the inmates were confiscated, Nina lost her mum, COVID hit, preventing Sofie in Denmark from travelling to Nuuk. The whole process then stretched over many years. Meanwhile, Nina, who was engaged in long conversations with Ruth, kept filming in Nuuk, putting the camera in a corner.”
As Paninnguaq Skydsbjerg turned from observer to co-protagonist, she and Rørdam went back to Hertling Péronard, asking him to take over the producing duties. “Nina was so emotionally involved in the story, it became impossible for her to make objective decisions anymore,” Rørdam says.
Asked how the inner walls that she had built around her over the years to protect herself from the truth of her traumatic childhood, suddenly fell in the presence of Ruth, Paninnguaq Skydsbjerg says: “I had been a survivor [of sexual abuse]. The transition from surviving to learning how to live is complicated, but Ruth didn’t feel sorry for me. She would say – oh yes, I feel the same way. Having lived similar traumas, Ruth recognized my feelings, the kind of filth I was dragging or running away from. She was in a place where she could not run away either and similarly, I knew I couldn’t run away anymore from my own issues in front of her.”
Turning on the touchy subject of alcoholism and domestic violence in Greenland, Hertling Péronard says being able as Greenlanders to reclaim that topic – as difficult as it may be, is part of regaining control of one’s own narrative. “Other filmmakers have made films about us, attracted by the contrast between the beautiful landscapes in Greenland and the social issues. It’s time for us to tell our own stories on film, at our own pace, to then be able to move past that as well as our post-colonial trauma.”
On the production front, Hertling Péronard [interestingly named Danish “Producer on the Move” in 2023] says the “weird” post-colonial relationships between Greenland and Denmark also affects film financing, although the situation is gradually improving. As he explains, when in 1979 Greenland obtained home ruling from Denmark, the Arctic island took over most domestic matters including culture. Access to funding – including from the Danish Film Institute was cut to Greenlanders. But thanks to the DFI-administered NORDDOK fund (established in 2019 to support documentary filmmaking and TV productions from Denmark, Greenland and the Faroe Islands), Hertling Péronard was able to produce “Walls” through his outfit Ánorâk Film’s Greenlandic outpost, not Danish for once. “It’s the first time in 10 years I could make a majority-Greenlandic film,” says the producer, who secured co-financing from broadcasters KNR TV in Greenland, RÚV in Iceland and DR in Denmark. Hertling Péronard said he is now looking forward to Greenland’s first film institute due to open early 2026 and local 25% tax rebates to really kickstart the local industry.
Quizzed about Trump’s pledge to annex Greenland, Hertling Péronard says: “When Trump Junior came to Greenland in January and mentioned that Greenlanders in Denmark feel like second or third-rate citizens and suffer from racism, it was odd for the first time to hear someone from the Trump family saying something true. But it did force Danish politicians to wake up a bit.” In the wake of the Democratic Party’s win at the recent elections, Hertling Péronard says he “feels hopeful that the leading party – and fervent Trump critic – will continue to build a collective feeling of unity.”
At CPH:DOX, Hertling Péronard will also launch a new project – “The Coil Case” – to be pitched at the co-production and co-financing showcase CPH:FORUM. Co-helmed by Sundance winner Camilla Nielsson (“President”) and Ulannaq Ingeman (“The Last Human”), the film tackles another post-colonial burning issue: the forced introduction in Greenlandic girls of contraceptive coils or IUD (intrauterine devices) in the 1960s-70s. Ánorâk Film is producing with multi-Oscar-nominated Danish outfit Final Cut for Real.
