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<P align="justify"> <i>Valkoin … <P align="justify"> <i>Valkoinen peura</i> The White Reindeer is a well-known film made by Erik Blomberg in 1952. It represents a romantic view of Lapland, and it was the first Finnish film to achieve international success, receiving awards in Cannes and Hollywood, for example. In its creation, the director strove for some degree of authenticity, although the wooing and wedding scenes combines elements of three or four different Saami cultures. They were created mainly on the basis of information culled from T.I. Itkonen. The film was shot in Saariselkä, and the knowledge of the local population was also used in making the film. The film is set in the 1930s or 1940s in some undefined Saami area, albeit in Finland to judge from the Kemi Saami shaman's drum that appears in it. Summary of the plot: a Saami girl called Pirita is born out in the snowy wastes as wolfs prowl around. The [[Joik - traditional song|juoiggus]] chant in the background suggests that she predestined to be a witch ([[Shamanism|shamanism]]). When she grows up into a young woman, Pirita takes part in a reindeer race and beats a reindeer herder called Aslak, who soon turns up to ask her to marry him. After the wedding, Pirita feels that she is not getting enough attention from Aslak; she becomes restless when she has to spend weeks on end alone especially at the time of the full moon. She goes to see an old shaman, who concocts an aphrodisiac drink for her. From the movements of the die on his drum he bids her to go home and sacrifice the first living creature that she encounters at the [[Sieidi (engl. ver.)|sieidi]] shrine, after which no reindeer herder will able to resist her. When Pirita touches the drum, the die starts to jump wildly and the skin splits; the shaman is terrified when he recognizes an even more powerful mana in the woman than his own. Pirita sacrifices the lucky white wild reindeer that she received from Aslak as a gift ([[The reindeer and the wild reindeer|Reindeer in mythology]]), at which she faints and receives from the sieidi the ability to change into a white reindeer. In this form she entices men to follow her and leads them to their death. The wild reindeer-witch arouses terror among the villagers, and the men begin to forge spear tips because a witch can only be killed with cold iron . Pirita sets off in distress to seek assistance from the shaman, whom she finds dead, and then from the sieidi, who refuses to release her from the spell. In the end, Aslak catches the white reindeer, which docilely surrenders itself to be killed, and as it dies it is metamorphosed back into human shape. Stories of humans changing into animal shapes were common in Saami folklore ([[Animal metamorphoses|Animal metamorphoses]]). However, the basic plot of The Wild Reindeer about a female witch changing into a wild reindeer is not part of the authentic Saami tradition. Another extraneous element that has been added to woo the non-Saami public is the [[Werewolf|werewolf]] theme. The original Saami tradition links both witchcraft and metamorphosis with men alone, but the story does not conflict substantially with Saami legend of the later tradition.</P>i legend of the later tradition.</P> +
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