Deep in the Siberian tundra, Ivanna tries to live her life as best she can. If someone told her twenty years ago that she would be raising five children alone and herding reindeer, she would have laughed in their face. Now, she’s just trying to make ends meet and not go crazy tending to her children’s constant bickering. Almost always seen with a cigarette dangling from her lips, Ivanna works hard to live a traditional Nenets life, leading her herd between feeding grounds in the hopes of fattening them up for the winter. Climate change bankrupts her by destabilizing weather patterns and killing her herd, forcing her and her children to move to Norilsk. There, her alcoholic husband awaits with a home for her and the children, but his addiction has left him jobless, adding to their financial woes.
Life of Ivanna is at times pure cinéma vérité, but it often steps over the line between documentation and voyeurism. These types of films work best when one of the family or someone from the shared culture performs the documentary work, but in Life of Ivanna, there are many moments that feel like straight up gawking. There are plenty of ways to show human connection and the universality of certain human experiences, but the directors and editors of this film just consistently picked things that were not particularly interesting or insightful. My other major gripe is how little the camera leaves Ivanna’s sled. The family comes and goes, but the camera just sits inside for the most part. I would have loved to watch the kids play in the snow and people tend to the reindeer or overhear some community gossip, but we’re stuck like a lump on a log for 60% of the film. It keeps us separate, alien, other… The opposite of the immersive quality of the best cinéma vérité documentaries.
Life of Ivanna will appeal best to those interested in learning about modern Nenets culture and lifestyles, and will have some broad appeal to patrons looking for stories about indigenous people. Consider this documentary a bit more highly if your collection serves a bustling anthropology department. Recommended.
Should academic and public libraries add this indigenous documentary to their collections?
Yes—Life of Ivanna is a valuable, if imperfect, addition to collections focused on indigenous studies, climate change, and contemporary anthropology. Despite concerns about the film’s perspective and choices around observation versus intrusion, it offers a rare, modern-day look into the life of a Nenets woman navigating both traditional reindeer herding and the pressures of urban relocation. For public libraries, this documentary can provide patrons with a deeper understanding of Arctic indigenous life and the real-world impact of climate change. Academic libraries, especially those supporting anthropology, environmental studies, gender studies, or Russian/Siberian cultural research, will find this a useful—if critique-worthy—resource for student engagement and discussion.
How can this indigenous documentary be used in classrooms or educational settings?
In classrooms, Life of Ivanna can serve as a starting point for discussions about indigenous identity, gender roles in nomadic communities, climate migration, and documentary ethics. In anthropology or ethnographic film courses, it invites a valuable critique of representation: Who gets to tell whose story? What responsibilities do filmmakers have when working with marginalized communities? Environmental studies programs may also use the film to show how climate change disproportionately affects indigenous livelihoods, while sociology or women's studies courses might focus on Ivanna’s strength, economic struggles, and the pressures of solo parenting in harsh conditions. Supplementing the film with guided questions or readings from indigenous voices will help students contextualize and analyze the material more critically.
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