Henry Larsen
1965 · 16m · Canada
Genres: biography, documentary, historical
Tones: contemplative, mythic
RCMP Superintendent Henry Larsen becomes the first person to navigate the Northwest Passage in both directions aboard the small patrol ship St. Roch.
Picked by Margot
The scouts
A 1965 NFB doc about Arctic navigation feels like the safest possible choice, which is precisely why I'm suspicious—but if there's something genuinely strange lurking in how they mythologize Larsen's obsession, a contrarian doc that subverts the expedition narrative from within, then we're talking.
Henry Larsen sits squarely in the NFB's documentary lineage of mythic portraiture, where formal rigor and contemplative pacing elevate a historical passage into something ceremonial; the 16-minute duration suggests a filmmaker confident enough to let landscape and character breathe rather than explain.
A 1965 short working with what must be archival footage and period constraints—the real move is probably in the sound design or a single editing choice that transforms navigation footage into something meditative rather than merely factual.