Where Eskimos Live

Child trade - There is nothing money can't buy.

Sharkey (Bob Hoskins) is in the business strictly for the money, and also because there is no shortage of couples who will resort to any means to acquire a child of their own. He believes that by engaging in this sordid business, he is giving deprived children not just a new homeland but also a warmth he never knew himself. The day arrives when circumstances force Sharkey to search for a child in a newly established Yugoslavia that is no longer war-tom but still filled with hostility and hatred.

There he meets a child from whom he will learn a great deal on the voyage back to Poland. The two protagonists create an odd couple of sorts; the emotionally dead Sharkey and Vlado, a child mentally transformed by war. They are the blind leading the lame as in the Bible and what changes them is not so much the war, with its hatred and brutality, but the simple fact that they go through it together.

Sharkey is a Pole in his fifties. He spent his childhood in and out of orphanages, had his brush with crime and miraculously emerged clean. Although he managed to break out of poverty and steer clear of crime, he remains an emotional cripple. His handicap is a need to remain cold and his policy not to become involved - especially in other people's affairs. Sharkey doesn't stick his neck out for anybody.

Vlado is ten years old. The horrendous experience he has gone through has taught him one fundamental rule: no holds are barred in the survival game. Nothing is unjustified, unacceptable or wrong if it is for the sake of staying alive. This principle saved him many times in seemingly hopeless situations. Vlado's practicality and resourcefulness has earned him a special place in a gang of youths that roams the land in search of military storehouses to rob. Vlado has seen his mother stabbed to death and can barely remember his father. Family is his only vulnerable spot and any mention of it softens him and tears him apart. His encounter with Sharkey reminds him of feelings he wanted to forget.

Their voyage together through the divided by hatred Yugoslavia will change them both. As it will turn out, you can learn just as much from a child as you can from a former thug turned best buddy. The many adventures and dramatic events that they will go through will bring them close enough to enable them to break out of the shells of indifference and egoism that enclosed them.

The shells had sheltered them from the world and were necessary for survival until they met. This road movie is a testimony of two people's struggle for friendship and their search for their own humanity.

Tomasz Wiszniewski's project Where Eskimos Live has been selected as the European Winner of the Sundance/NHK International Filmmakers Award.
Poland's Tomasz Wiszniewski labeled by British Screen International as Poland's next young hotshot will helm the picture. His directorial experience includes two made-for-TV films and an award winning feature The Wretch.

Set against the chiling backdrop of war torn Yugoslavia, Where Eskimos Live is a powerful and moving tale an unlikely friendship between a Bosnian orphan (Vlado) and a Polish con-man (Sharkey) who specializes in the lucrative business of child trafficing. After desperate efforts to smuggle Vlado to safety in Poland, Sharkey learns from his clients, the Russian mafia, the insidious fate that awaits his young companion. Where Eskimos Live recounts one man's struggle to find his humanity in a world bereft of moral grounding at a complex and pivital moment in history.

The entire screenplay is available for public viewing.

Director: Tomasz Wiszniewski

Producers: Chris Burdza, Paula Paizes

Webmaster: Yvonne Szymański