Review: The Snow Walker

Posted by: Tom Milroy  •  March 5, 2004 @ 11:59am

Filed under: Reviews

Charles Martin Smith loves our frozen tundra and Farley Mowat. In 1983, he starred in Never Cry Wolf, adapted from Mowat's book. Now, he directs The Snow Walker, another movie based on works by Farley Mowat. Like Never Cry Wolf, this movie is just as entertaining.

Barry Pepper and Annabella Piugattuk star in this lost-in-the-north story. The story is simple enough: Pepper is pilot Charlie Halliday, who is on a routine mission and comes across a small band of Inuit people. In exchange for a pair of valuable walrus tusks, Charlie agrees to take a sick young woman to Yellowknife for treatment. His plane crashes, and the two are left alone in the wild.

The scenery is breath-taking. Much of it was shot in Churchill, and it's nice for a change to see a movie unencumbered by computer-generated effects. As you'd expect, the hot-shot pilot Pepper portrays changes along their journey. While he helps her, she helps him how to survive the north.

Charles Martin Smith the director has come a long way since playing "Toad" in Amerian Graffiti. He was billed as the less formal "Charlie" then.

You should check out The Snow Walker, it's worth the walk to the theatre.