"Same Jakki" was the first film to make an international cinema audience acquainted with Sami life. Its director Per Høst, a legendary character in Norwegian documentary filmmaking and a role model for "wildlife" filmers such as Thor Heyerdahl and Richard Attenborough, presents an extensive portrait of the Sami culture and lifestyle from the point of view of a social anthropologist. Combined with acted sequences that centre on a Sami family and its herd of reindeer, he shows a nomadic culture just before its extinction. Today, "Same Jakki" is regarded as nostalgic, its admirating stance towards the nomads as romanticising. Nevertheless the film has made a long term contribution to the acceptance of the Sami people in Norway. Even if "Same Jakki" is clearly anchored in the spirit of the era it was made in, its fantastic images of nature can still captivate cinema audiences today. Most importantly, though, the film's documentary passages have preserved the material culture of an indigenous minority that can no longer be observed outside of museums.