In 1997, Danish filmmaker Morten Hartkorn turned his camera towards Greenland for Den sidste koloni — The Last Colony — a documentary whose title alone posed an uncomfortable question about the relationship between Denmark and Greenland.
Produced at a time when Greenland had enjoyed Home Rule for almost two decades, the film looks beyond constitutional definitions to examine the social consequences of Greenland’s rapid transformation during and after Danish colonial rule. Centred on Ammassalik in East Greenland, the documentary focuses particularly on a community struggling with alcoholism, suicide, social dislocation and uncertainty about the future. Nearly three decades later, Den sidste koloni remains an intriguing document not only of Greenland in the 1990s, but also of the way Denmark was beginning to look more critically at its own role in Greenlandic history.
A colony that officially no longer existed
The provocative title requires some historical context. Greenland formally ceased to have the status of a Danish colony in 1953, when a revision of the Danish constitution incorporated it into the Kingdom of Denmark. Greenland subsequently obtained Home Rule in 1979, establishing its own parliament and government and gradually taking responsibility for an increasing number of domestic affairs. When Hartkorn made Den sidste koloni in 1997, therefore, Greenland was not legally a colony. But the documentary’s title suggests a broader question: can colonial relationships disappear simply because their constitutional terminology changes? That question runs through discussions of modern Greenland. The transformation imposed during the twentieth century was extraordinarily rapid. Traditional ways of life encountered an intensive programme of modernisation, urbanisation, Danish-language education and administrative centralisation. Communities that had developed around hunting and fishing were increasingly drawn into institutions and economic structures modelled on Denmark. For Hartkorn’s film, the consequences of this picture transformation are not merely historical. They are visible in individual lives.
Ammassalik and the darker side of modernisation
Den sidste koloni attracted attention for its depiction of Ammassalik, today generally known by the name of its main town, Tasiilaq, and the surrounding East Greenlandic society. The documentary addresses some of Greenland’s most painful social problems, particularly alcohol abuse and suicide. These were not marginal questions in Greenland during the period. Contemporary statistics showed extraordinarily high levels of suicide, particularly among younger men, while alcohol had become an important subject of political and public-health debate. A Norwegian commentary published after the documentary was broadcast by NRK in 1998 specifically grouped Den sidste koloni with other contemporary films and television reports dealing with alcoholism, suicide and uncertainty about Greenland’s future. Hartkorn’s film connects these difficulties to the enormous cultural disruption experienced by Greenland during the twentieth century. The implicit argument is powerful: Denmark may have brought housing, hospitals, education, infrastructure and the institutions of a modern welfare state, but modernisation also dismantled or weakened existing social structures at extraordinary speed. The result cannot be reduced to a simple story of either Danish benevolence or Danish oppression. It is precisely within that uncomfortable space that Den sidste koloni operates.
Who gets to explain Greenland?
There is, however, another reason why the documentary is interesting today. The way Greenland was represented by Scandinavian media during the 1990s has itself become a subject worthy of criticism. The contemporary Norwegian response to Den sidste koloni, for example, warned that television reports concentrating on suicide and alcohol could leave audiences with a profoundly distorted picture of Greenlandic society. The problems were real, the author argued, but Greenlandic life consisted of considerably more than those problems. That observation gives the film an additional layer when watched from a twenty-first-century perspective. A documentary intended to expose the consequences of colonialism can still reproduce a colonial mechanism if Greenland is primarily presented through Danish eyes: Greenland becomes the troubled object being examined, while outsiders retain the authority to explain what has happened to it. This does not invalidate Hartkorn’s documentary. Rather, it makes Den sidste koloni particularly valuable as a historical media document. It tells us something about Greenland, but also about Denmark’s evolving understanding of Greenland in the 1990s. Questions that would now immediately arise — whose voices are heard, who controls the narrative, and whether Greenlanders themselves are being allowed to define the causes of their society’s problems — were only beginning to become central to mainstream Nordic discussions of colonial representation.
Morten Hartkorn and a remarkable year
Hartkorn was both writer and director of Den sidste koloni, released as a television documentary in 1997. His filmography also includes Den sorte gryde (1994), Færdigt arbejde (1995) and Arbejdets triumf (1995). Significantly, Den sidste koloni was not his only Greenland-related production that year. Hartkorn also wrote and directed Kvinden fra Godthåb (The Woman from Godthåb) in 1997. Together, the works belong to a period in which Danish cultural debate was becoming increasingly willing to reconsider the traditional narrative of Denmark as an essentially benign presence in Greenland. That reassessment has only intensified since.
A documentary that reached Greenland’s Parliament
The controversy surrounding Den sidste koloni did not disappear after its original broadcast. In 2005, the film was explicitly discussed in Greenland’s Parliament (Inatsisartut) during a debate involving the political party ATASSUT. The party described Morten Hartkorn’s documentary as controversial and argued that it had placed excessive emphasis on negative aspects of Greenlandic society. ATASSUT also noted that the film had generated considerable debate both in Greenland and in Denmark, demonstrating that Den sidste koloni had become more than simply a television documentary: it had entered the wider political discussion about how Greenland and its social problems were represented, particularly when that representation came from outside Greenland. The parliamentary reference is especially significant because it came eight years after the film was made, suggesting that its portrayal of Greenland continued to resonate — and provoke disagreement — long after its initial release.
From Home Rule to Self-Government
The political relationship depicted in the background of Hartkorn’s documentary has changed considerably since 1997. In 2008, Greenlanders voted overwhelmingly in favour of expanded autonomy. The resulting Act on Greenland Self-Government entered into force on 21 June 2009, replacing the 1979 Home Rule arrangement. The legislation explicitly recognises the Greenlandic people as a people under international law with a right to self-determination. Greenland now has its own parliament, Inatsisartut, and government, Naalakkersuisut, and can assume responsibility for additional areas previously administered by Denmark. The 2009 legislation also established Greenlandic as the official language and created a legal route towards independence should Greenlanders choose it. Yet Greenland remains part of the Kingdom of Denmark, and the relationship between the two countries continues to generate debates about political sovereignty, economic dependence, cultural identity and historical responsibility. That makes the title The Last Colony arguably even more provocative today than it was in 1997.
A documentary worth rediscovering
Den sidste koloni belongs to a particular moment in Nordic documentary filmmaking. Its visual and journalistic language comes from the television documentary tradition of the 1990s, but the questions behind it have not disappeared. If anything, they have moved towards the centre of Nordic political debate. What does decolonisation actually mean? Is political autonomy enough if economic and institutional dependencies remain? How much responsibility does a former colonial power bear for social problems that developed during rapid modernisation? And who has the right to tell that history? The answers offered in 1997 cannot simply be transferred to Greenland today. Nor should the documentary’s bleak depiction of social problems be mistaken for a complete portrait of Greenlandic society. But that is precisely why Den sidste koloni deserves renewed attention. Seen today, it works on two levels: as a documentary about the difficult legacy of Danish rule in Greenland and as an artefact from an era when Denmark itself was beginning to reconsider the language through which Greenland had traditionally been understood. Its title ultimately leaves the most important question unresolved. When does a colony truly stop being a colony — when its legal status changes, when political power is transferred, or only when the people who were colonised have acquired the power to define their own future and tell their own story?
For Greenland, that debate is still very much alive.
Suggested Online Sources
IMDb — Morten Hartkorn filmography
Dagbladet — contemporary 1998 discussion of Den sidste koloni and Greenlandic representation
Danish Prime Minister’s Office — Greenland and Self-Government
Retsinformation — Act on Greenland Self-Government
iCheckMovies — Morten Hartkorn filmography
Greenland Parliament — 2005 discussion mentioning Den Sidste Koloni
