Despite the challenges facing documentaries Heidi Ewing and Rachel Gradu Under to do “Folktales” (Magnolia), The film was easy to finance. Neither the frozen setting 300 miles above the Arctic circle nor the foreign Norwegian language was their biggest obstacle. It was Gen Z.
Ewing and Gradu found funding for ”Folk“Because they have been around for a while. They are at the top of the documentary Pyramid, with an Oscar nomination (2007’s” Jesus Camp “) and a string of high-driven assignments such as” Norman Lear: just another version of you. “(Ewing also directed one narrative function“I carry you with me.”)
They know what makes an engaging documentary. “There must be a reason why it is a movie and not a New Yorker article, a podcast, a letter to your mom, a dinner call,” Ewing told IndieWire about Zoom. “This is fundamental. A topic is not a movie. Does it have a strong visual element? We are truth Filmmaker. It is an ineffective type of filmmaking. What causes some to take one direction versus the other? What information or emotions penetrate a young person who actually has a lasting impact? Then we throw characters who seem to want to change and want to be different for some time. ”
Ewing and Gradu have observed teens before (“The Boys of Baraka”, “Jesus Camp”). This time it is a group that registers for a gap at a revered school in Norway’s Arctic North who teaches survival skills and dog sledding. “This film Had all the petitions, “Ewing said.” There were many reasons not to do so, but the reasons for doing so considered them. “
Despite ongoing issues within the independent and non -fiction sectors, the film was not difficult to get from the ground. “We didn’t go to a streamer,” Ewing said. “We went right to Private Equity. We wanted editorial control over this movie. We had to raise the money extremely quickly because we got access to the school and decided to make the film in March 2023 and started shooting in June 2023, and the film opened Sundance 2025.”
First, they stood up Impact Partners, since the fifth season (formerly Strävan content) and subject studios. It was possible only because Ewing and Gradu have established themselves over the years as a reliable filmmaker. “We have been around for a minute. We would deliver them a movie, even if it was difficult, and we couldn’t tell them who the characters were because we couldn’t throw it yet,” Ewing said. “There was a level of trust that was given us because of our pedigree because of our body of work. It would not have happened if this was our second or third film.”
The second draw for the filmmakers and their financiers? The dogs. “We both have dogs,” Gradu said. “Dogs make us feel good. Dogs make us feel less selfish, not the center of the world. Then we start this way for these special schools that help people find out what their purpose and meaning is, and they use Arctic survival as a means of reminding people that there has been Eons behind you about existence and the life cycle, and it will be many.”
When the filmmakers learned about schools that use dogs as a way to teach people to be better people, “we were in, because we are both dog lovers,” Gradu said. “Dogs bring out the best in humans. They make them more patient, they make them more gentle, they take up human humor. You have to take care of this animal. We knew, after filming young people for several years, that these dogs would touch them and change them. And what a genius idea to remind people about how to be human.
When the filmmakers visited the Pasvik Folk School, they saw what the children went through. “They did so hard things and they tested themselves,” Gradu said. “And the teachers showed us that we could do it. And we said,” Fuck it, we can do it. “As a filmmaker, that was there.
During production, the filmmakers met physical challenges – Polar night provided about two hours of sunlight per day and production challenges. “They’re not exactly the same,” Ewing said. “It is almost impossible to photograph dog sledding. But truthfully, it wasn’t really the cold or darkness or sled, which was difficult to shoot. I love the technical things: figure out the right lenses, work with DPS, sort out the challenges with the harnesses, plan,” how should we photograph this? “Do we need a snowmobile?
This is because Gen Z is used to check their image. Their world is selfie. “They don’t fully trust outsiders to come in and chronicate their lives,” Ewing said. “Why should they be, when everything in the universe in social media is about” me “and” I control, I edit “? These European children do not want to be famous, do not want to be more influenced. We had nothing to offer them outside,” Hello, this can be an interesting experience. “
It took time to build trust. “The conditions were built, but it was always to have to be earned and reached again,” Ewing said. “And it was never easy. I would say that the last few months were easiest. It is obvious that it is up to them whether we can film something or not. They can say that you should take a hike and you have to leave. It is normal in truth filmmaking. But it was important that the students knew they could always say: ‘I’m not comfortable’ or ‘turn off the camera.’ And when they understood it, because they saw us go away many times, it became easier. It tried to find a common purpose with the film with them. ”
“We have been filming young people for two decades,” Gradu said. “So a 14-year-old 20 years ago and a 14-year-old 10 years ago, and a 14-year-old is now completely different social animals. It was the first time we filmed young people in this modern context. So it was a surprise at first. We had to adapt. Our usual things did not work. They did not have this incentive for us.
What they have seen is reality TV: “Love Island”, “Big Brother”, “Survivor.” “It’s hard to explain that we’re not,” Gradu said. “We ask you not to create conflict where there is none. We will also not put a filter on them where they look perfect. It was another type of trust. It was real anthropology.”
One solution was “Gen z safari,” A camera equipped with Bazooka lenses, “Longer and longer and longer lenses so they wouldn’t care about us,” Ewing said. A large sequence, when the campers camp alone in tents in the snowy forest, demanded that the filmmakers should not be seen at all.
“We had to hire a 1200-millimeter lens with an extender for the solo evenings, because we promised the students and teachers that they would actually be alone, and we only had to approach the students when the teachers did a security check, and they were microphone,” Ewing said. “We were out 14 hours in the snow. We had military shoes over shoes. We had special tools, and we would only sit in the snow, and they had some spotlights on which was our only light source. It was one of the most built -up sequences in the film. We had to learn deeply and constant patience in the snow and confidence that you would expect, something to happen, something would happen.
The filmmakers whistled down their characters to three: those with whom they are bound, who “can formulate what they are looking for,” Ewing said. “All these three young people told us the very first time that we talked to them what they wanted. This is a way. And if you can help them on that trip and you are rooting for them, there is an incentive. The special goals they told us, so they wanted to be part of it in some way.”
Putting introverts on film is rare. At the festival circle, the filmmakers were surprised at how the audience responded to them. “Young audience gravitates to the most introverted character because they see themselves,” Gradu said. “Documentaries do not show introverts because they do not participate in the films. Only fiction has introverted.”
The technical requirements for shooting in the Arctic were huge. The temperature was negative 30 degrees Fahrenheit, which affects batteries. “The drone continued to break and fell down,” Ewing said. “We had to look for it a lot of times. We always sent it back and forth to Germany and did not tell why. It was broken all the time.”
The dog -detective sequences are exciting to look at but were difficult to shoot. The filmmakers could not put their cinematic photographer on the sled. “It’s too heavy,” Ewing said, “unless he has his own separate package of dogs. So we got one or two of these shots. But the best way to photograph dog sledding is if you have a snowmobile along the dogs. You need a trolley to be built on the back of it, so you can sit in your DPS, with all your gear.”
Norway applies restrictions on where you can put snowmobile tracks. The place was near the Russian border, so the filmmakers had to call the military every time they put the drone in heaven, or they would create an international incident.
“If you fly 300 feet in the wrong direction, they will push it down,” Ewing said. “So we always call the military, and we get to know them.” Can we fly it? “The sound has often stuck; GoPro, which I said I would never use in my career, because it is too stupid sports things well, GoPro saved us several times.
Since the film is a theater edition, the filmmakers returned to the festival circle for the first time since their self -published “Detropia” in 2012. “The last films we have made, we do one or two festivals, and they are broadcast on HBO or Netflix or whatever, because there is never a long tail anymore when you make a movie with a stream.” “They want to get it on the air directly. We went from Sundance to Oslo to Thessaloniki, Greece, to Nantucket, full frame, and tried to build words of mouth, because this is an old school theater edition of a documentary. Out-of-Control audience, and you have an emotional audience.
Magnolia Pictures released “Folktales” in New York on July 25 and in Los Angeles and Other markets August 1st.
