Deep into indigenous territory within the Brazilian rainforest a local activist and his team are fighting back with a video camera as a weapon. Their provocative and often heart-breaking story is impressively recorded by documentary director and cinematographer Alex Pritz who joins them to stress the urgency of the dilemma facing both land and people.
Screening in The Hague-based Movies That Matter human right fest, the film garnered a CPH:DOX F:act Special Mention having previously won the World Cinema – Documentary Audience and Documentary Craft Special Jury Awards at Sundance earlier this year.
In the Brazilian rainforest, a battle is being waged between the last of the indigenous Uru-eu-wau-wau tribe and the farmers who – with support from Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro – are slowly cutting into their otherwise protected territory, an area of some 7,000 square miles. The film spends time with chainsaw-wielding settlers, often poor farmers being encouraged to get their piece of the ‘Brazilian dream,’ as well as with 18 year-old activist Bitaté who has no intention of giving up without a fight. Together with his mentor, female activist Neidinha Bandeira, he is building an army of self-taught journalists to patrol the jungle and catch the land grabbers in action.
Co-produced by the Uru-eu-wau-wau community (reduced from thousands to a population of less than 200 people) the film heads deep into the lush rainforest to detail the clash between locals and the farmers (who often see themselves as pioneers in a Brazilian version of the American Wild West), who are supported by Bolsonaro’s frightening election promise that “There won’t be one inch of Indigenous land left”.
Pritz, who co-ordinated with the community and set up workshops to help locals learn how to use cameras and drones, shares a cinematography credit with Tangae Uru-eu-wau-wau, with the pair combining talents to deliver a striking delve into the tough realities of life in a landscape being continually driven back. The sound of chainsaws is a terrifying precursor to settlers burning down parts of the forest as they claim land for their cattle, with dark smoke an ominous sign to the Uru-eu-wau-wau that more land is lost.
With a video camera as their only weapon against the chainsaws, Bitaté and his men risk their lives to stop the clearing of the forest before it’s too late. The Territory is a highly involving and dramatic documentary in which the battle between right and wrong runs the full gamut of emotions.
As trees are felled and fires lit, there is a deep sense of anger for the loss of a natural resource and the impact on the Uru-eu-wau-wau, though at the same time the nominal miscreants (the settlers who say they won’t give up) are also following up on promises and commitments made by Bolsonaro…who, in truth, is the ultimate villain of this story.
Denmark-US-Brazil, 2022, 85mins
Dir: Alex Pritz
Production: Documist, Doc Society, Passiona pictures, Protozoa Pictures, Real Lava, Time Studios, XTR, Associacao Jupau do Povo Uru-eu-wau-wau
International sales: Real Lava
Producers: Darren Aronofsky, Will N. Miller, Gabriel Uchida, Lizzie Gillett, Sigrid Jonsson Dyekjær, Will Miller
Cinematography: Alex Pritz, Tangae Uru-eu-wau-wau
Editor: Carlos Rojas Felice
Music: Katya Mihailova
