‘White Gold of Greenland’ Doc Adds Urgency to Arctic Island’s Push for Freedom Amid Trump Threat: It’s ‘Wanted to Be Independent for Decades’
Just as Donald Trump escalates efforts to annex Greenland — the better to access its rich minerals and strategic sea routes — an explosive documentary, “The White Gold of Greenland,” has become a flash point in the Arctic island’s ongoing push for decolonization and freedom from greedy outsiders.
The doc, directed by Claus Pilehave and Otto Rosing, asserts that between 1854 and 1987, Danish mining companies extracted nearly $58 billion worth of a precious mineral that is crucial for producing aluminium, but pumped little of that massive wealth back into Greenland’s economy.
“In Denmark there had always been this narrative about the country paying a lot of money to develop Greenland,” Pilehave tells Variety. “But in this case we could see: Wow! There’s been money going the other way from this cryolite mine.”
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“White Gold of Greenland” follows Naja Graugaard, a researcher in colonial relations between Greenland and Denmark, as she uncovers the exploitation and ponders its impact with her Inuit grandmother, who lives in a village near the mine. The doc premiered in Nuuk, Greenland’s capital, to a rapturous response in February, on the eve of Greenland’s March 11 elections, and was immediately released on Danish national broadcaster DR. Just two weeks later, “White Gold” was pulled from the platform after it sparked fierce reactions from local politicians and economists who claimed the $58 billion figure was skewed. This caused DR editor-in-chief Thomas Falbe to reportedly be fired for airing the doc.
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Culture minister Jakob Engel-Schmidt blasted the doc’s makers for failing to make clear “the difference between revenue and profit.”
“It’s misleading, irresponsible and comes at the worst moment,” Engel-Schmidt said on Facebook referring to the fact that it aired in the leadup to elections considered crucial in shaping Greenland’s future relations with both the U.S. and Denmark, which colonized Greenland 300 years ago and still controls its foreign policy, defense and other affairs.
To Greenlanders, “White Gold” getting quashed – since play on DR was the only way to see it – “was really a slap in the face,” says its producer Michael Bévort. “I mean, here was a film that spoke for them and was seen as a Greenlandic voice in the debate,” he says. “And then it was pulled by a discussion over numbers.”
Bévort also points out that Denmark’s censorious reaction “probably mattered much more than the film itself,” meaning that pulling “White Gold” caused an even greater stir in Greenland than its anti-colonial implications per se.
Enter the International Sámi Film Institute in Kautokeino, Norway. The organization, which is dedicated to the Sámi and to other Indigenous people in the Nordic countries, decided in mid-March to make “The White Gold of Greenland” available to stream on its platform in Norway, Sweden, Finland, Greenland, Canada and Germany.
Sámi Film Institute chief Anne Lajla Utsi says the institute released the doc “because we want to showcase the Indigenous perspective.” She notes that the group had not independently analyzed the numbers that led DR to remove it from its platform, “but we have watched it and believe others should have the opportunity to do the same, especially the people of Greenland.”
The doc clearly struck a chord with Greenlanders as they mulled their geopolitical future.
According to a Verian Group poll conducted prior to the elections for national daily Sermitsiaq, 36% of respondents said “White Gold” would influence their vote, though the survey did not specify how.
The elections saw the surprise victory of Jens-Frederik Nielsen, leader of the center-right Demokraatit party, who, at 33, became the nation’s youngest prime minister. Nielsen, who favours a softer approach to independence from Denmark than his opponents, was quick to push back against both Trump’s aims for Greenland and Denmark’s colonial constraints.
“We don’t want to be Americans. No, we don’t want to be Danes. We want to be Greenlanders,” he told Sky News.
Nielsen gave Vice President JD Vance the cold shoulder when he visited the Pituffik space base in northwestern Greenland in late March. After Vance departed, Trump in Washington ominously told NBC News that military force wasn’t off the table with regard to annexing the island.
“President Trump says that the United States ‘will get Greenland.’ Let me be clear: The United States will not get it. We do not belong to anyone else,” Nielsen said on Facebook reacting to Trump’s saber rattling.
“What has been going on is that Greenland has wanted to be independent for decades,” says Bévort.
“But there is a gross misunderstanding about this abroad, and also in Denmark,” he notes.
“I think for the Greenlanders this doesn’t mean they want to be alone in the middle of nowhere. It just means they want to renegotiate their relationship with Denmark in order to have equal standing.”
