Conflation, Contradiction and the Colonized Mind

Abstract

In Vincent Ward’s 1993 film Map of the Human Heart a compelling and sophisticated piece of border writing is constructed in the telling of a story of the relation between a half-cast Inuit boy, Avik, and the adventurer who would fly, literally, into his life just prior to World War II. Walter Russell (Patrick Bergen) is a cartographer, charting the Northwest Territories for the British when he encounters the young Avik bouncing on a hide like some trampoline. Walter stays with the Inuit and, realizing Avik has contracted tuberculosis, he convinces Avik’s family he should be taken away to convalesce in Montreal. Here Avik meets Albertine (Anne Parillaud), a young half-breed tomboy who is also being treated by the Catholic nuns, who becomes the young boy’s first love.