The synopsis of Slash/Back caught my attention and made me google the word ‘inuit’ from Inuit science fiction. It represents the north of Canada; the location of the hamlet that serves as the setting for this Nyla Innuksuk directorial. Audiences get taken to a faraway land untouched by glamor, pristine with nature, and a base for aliens. The alien invaders chose a location away from the global spotlight, but they made one mistake, i.e. landing in a village of hunters. The bravery of a small group ultimately proved to be the undoing of the earth’s unwanted visitors.
Slash/Back (2022) Plot Summary & Movie Synopsis:
The film (Slash/Back) began with a tentacle dragging a man to the ground and killing him. It showed audiences that the external presence was there, and chaos would ensue. We then got taken to Pangnirtung, Nunavut, where phones and data were a novelty and the close-knit unit had nothing to do but outdoor activities. They decided to head off in a boat but encountered a polar bear. The children shot the animal in self-defense but attracted its attention. A second bullet connected with the bear and spilled its black blood all over the small Aju.
Attacks continued with a fisherman also falling victim to the aliens. On solstice day, the village organized a dance that saw every adult attend. The kids decided to convene at another location, but Uki, decided to roam outdoors. She was spotted by a young polar bear and slashed its neck in a bid to escape. The adult alien polar bear found its cub and learned that it perished at human hands. Hence, it headed toward town to wear a human skin and attack the children.
Uki reached the party house and spilled the beans. Maika dismissed her, but the alien host policeman’s entry earned her an unlikely ally. The group of youngsters regrouped and came up with a plan to trap their pursuers and end them once and for all. They elected to serve as bait themselves (Uki refusing Maika’s claim that she would be the bait and volunteering for the role herself), trusting their companions to do the needful. Why did they have to fight the aliens themselves? Well, no adult was around, as they had kept their phones aside for the dance. The one adult that did respond, fell.
Slash/Back (2022) Movie Ending, Explained:
The ending saw the trio of Uki, Jesse, and Maika, along with one of their friends, lay a trap for the remaining alien. Their plan worked as the car trapped it in a hook and pulled it along the dusty road, but Maika struggled to shoot it down. Subsequently, the alien, who realized it was alone, proceeded to Aju’s house and tried to get an adult accomplice, i.e. Maika’s father. Distracted by the arrival of Jesse and Maika, the alien tackled him and pinned him to the ground. The two girls couldn’t help as the alien had pinned them under furniture. Maika, who struggled to break free, shouted advice to her father and faded. She then saw a vision of him handing her younger self a blade, telling her she will be a hunter.
The alien tried to catch him with its tentacles, but he resisted and ripped off its face. As the disoriented creature let the man go, he rushed to a blade and presented it to his daughter. She swiftly took it out of its holder and slashed the alien to end the reign of terror. Minutes later, there were visible signs of an object exiting the Earth’s atmosphere. Also, on the ground, the signs of life within the tentacles vanished, and they became limp; not before it was all captured on video.
Why were the aliens after the group of children?
In the film, the children shot the polar bear before it attacked the smallest member of the group. When her friends shot the bear, blood spilled on the small child. The same issue of blood spilling occurred when Uki visited the location of the first shooting and had to defend herself from a polar bear cub.
The out worldly beings were after the black blood, and as the children had it on their clothes, they were the target of the creatures. Hence, they weren’t specifically after the children as they were small and easy targets.
Why did the policeman get taken despite not having blood on him?
When Maika, Leena, Jesse, and Uki brainstormed about the aliens for any weakness, they realized that the monsters had tentacles from which claws emerged. However, to get close to somebody to use them, they needed to cover their identities, i.e. they had to be like sheep in wolf’s clothing. As the policeman was distracted, he fell victim to the ‘polar bear’ attack. This wasn’t an out-of-the-blue attack, as a geologist and a fisherman were the other two humans to get taken by the aliens.
Did Pangnirtung, Nunavut, rid itself of the unwelcome visitors?
Once Uki, Jesse, and Maika beat the final alien, they went to free their friends in the outhouse. Following the joyous reunion, the group of youngsters stared into the distance towards the patch of land where the spaceship holding the tentacular creature had landed. A beam of red light connected the ground to the sky, following which a spaceship-looking shape ascended and zoomed off. The kids cheered as they succeeded in saving their small community and driving the invaders away from their quiet home.
What happened at the end?
A month after the solstice dance that saw the children best the aliens, life went back to normal at Pangnirtung, Nunavut. However, newshounds still saw potential in the story and kept visiting the hamlet. Maika’s expression as she saw the reporter and video journalist arrive was one of exasperation. It may have been as though she had kept on giving interview after interview to the point of exhaustion. When questioned, she stuck to her story of being a hunter, the exact principle which helped her thwart the aliens’ plans.
It was also pleasing to see Uki get to take the spotlight after being chastised for seemingly making stories. She took the attention like a natural and proceeded to narrate the events that formed the basis of Slash/Back.
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