‘One with the Whale’ review: Climate change and animal activists threaten an Indigenous Alaskan community

In the remote Alaskan village of Gambell on St. Lawrence Island in the Bering Sea, students are allowed 10 excused absences a year for subsistence activities, primarily hunting. “If you don’t do subsistence activities, you die,” says the school principal in the documentary “One with the Whale,” airing this week on public television as part of Independent Lens.

“One with the Whale” mainly follows the Apassingok family, but it also captures a broader context of life in Gambell, where the population is primarily Yup’ik Indigenous and numbers less than 700. Everything has to be flown in, which is expensive. When Mom goes shopping for groceries at the Gambell Native Store, she says they spend $300 to $500 a week on food. She holds up a box of Minute instant rice: $11.29. A six-pack of toilet paper is $13. Fresh produce is in short supply.

We learn that internet service came to Gambell fairly recently, but nearly everyone on camera has a smartphone. In 2017, Chris caught his first whale and the photos were shared on Facebook. Locally, he was celebrated as a provider. But hundreds of thousands of hateful messages and death threats came pouring in from people outside the community, primarily followers of Paul Watson, who is known for the reality series “Whale Wars.

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