Is the fictional account the same one that I'm talking about that they based this series on?
I believe the food/lead poisoning part is fairly well established fact by the way, they worked that out long before they found the wrecks. Going by my brief research into it, anyway. And yes, the Inuit knowing where the wrecks were all these years is pretty funny really.
It was a different, earlier novel, can't remember the title. It didn't have a monster bear. "Fatal Passage" rings a bell, but I may be conflating two books.
This is a Ridley Scott and all, sooo I shouldn't have been too surprised by the contrivance of the ships doctor going mad, dousing a mid-winter carnival for desperate sailors in lighter fluid, touching it off then self-immolating, moments after the coincidental return of the main Innu woman character sans tongue, but I was very surprised.
In fairness, with a bit of reducing-the-number-of-key-characters-to-keep-track-of, I think that bit's straight from the book rather than Ridley. He's a producer on it, did he do any more than line up the finance for people?