EXCLUSIVE: New York-based arthouse distributor KimStim has acquired North American rights to feature-doc The Falling Sky, in regards to the risk to the existence of the Amazonian Yanomami individuals, forward of its screening in DOC NYC subsequent month.
The immersive and poetic movie facilities on iconic shaman Davi Kopenawa and the Yanomami neighborhood. It’s based mostly on the ebook of the identical title by Kopenawa and French anthropologist Bruce Albert and is co-directed by Eryk Rocha & Gabriela Carneiro da Cunha.
Narrated by Kopenawa, the doc traces the preparations of his Indigenous neighborhood of Watorikɨ because it engages in a funeral ceremony generally known as the Reahu, which is a collective effort to carry up the sky and forestall it from falling. This ceremony additionally galvanizes the neighborhood in its battle to defend their homeland from unlawful gold mining.
KimStim’s co-president Ian Stimler negotiated the cope with China-based worldwide gross sales agent Rediance.
The movie is a Brazilian-Italian co-production between Aruac Filmes and Stemal Leisure with Rai Cinema, in collaboration with Les Movies d’Ici, with the participation of the Hutukara Yanomami Affiliation.
The movie world premiered within the Cannes Movie Pageant’s parallel part Administrators’ Fortnight in Could and can play in DOC NYC’s Kaleidoscope Competitors.
The Yanomami lived in relative isolation till the Nineteen Seventies, when the development of the North Perimeter freeway throughout their land by the navy dictatorship of the time uncovered them to the so-called civilized world.
The arrival of the route introduced with it frequent illnesses – which have been lethal for the neighborhood because it had no immunity – in addition to 1000’s of miners prospecting for gold.
The neighborhood loved transient respite within the Nineteen Nineties following the creation of the Yanomami Park defending the land, which led to the expulsion of the miners.
The Yanomami individuals discovered themselves beneath risk once more beneath Jair Bolsonaro’s 2019 to 2022 presidency. Brazenly in opposition to Indigenous communities, he stifled state assist packages and likewise inspired the business exploitation of their land which led to deforestation, rising poverty charges and the murders of a lot of Indigenous activists.
In The Falling Sky, Rocha and Carneiro da Cunha enable the Yanomami to inform the story in their very own phrases, highlighting the resilience of the traditional neighborhood and showcasing the pure marvel of the world they’re combating to guard.
The doc is Rocha’s tenth function movie, and his third time at Cannes, the place he beforehand received the L’Oeil d’Or Award for Cinema Novo in 2016. Co-director Carneiro da Cunha is a Brazilian artist, theater director, performer, filmmaker and environmental artwork activist who has labored for greater than a decade with the Brazilian Amazon.
