SHERDOG MOVIE CLUB: Week 130 - Embrace of the Serpent

[Scott Parker 27]

Shit, Im still in the middle of watching. Will report back when done, seems promising so far though.

 

[Cubo de Sangre]

Shit, Im still in the middle of watching. Will report back when done, seems promising so far though.

If you like man-ass and loincloths it's pretty good.

 

[Tufts]

The plaque says: In recognition of the courage of the Columbian rubber pioneers, who, risking their lives and goods, bring civilization to a land of cannibals and savages, showing them the way to our lord and sacred church. Rafael Reyes August 1907.

Interesting that the camera lingers on the plaque the first time around because

We have the cannibalism inherent in Catholicism (the symbolic eating of the body of Christ and the drinking of his blood)
and
The stereotypical belief that indigenous tribes were cannibals
to finally
Karamakate purposely drugging the members of the Church, including their self proclaimed Messiah, which leads to the "enlightened" engaging in cannibalism.

As Karamakate said: It was the worse of both worlds.

 

[Yotsuya]

I did wonder why the film was filmed in black and white. It would have been incredibly green otherwise. Was it to make the hallucinations stand out at the end? Was it to give that sense that our realities are limited by our perceptions? It made me think of a Joe Rogan podcast where he interviewed Michael Pollan about hallucinogens and how they open our brains up to experiences and connections we cannot have otherwise

One of my favorite JRE episodes was with Dennis McKenna. He told how he and his brother Terence went for an expedition 1971 to Colombian Amazon to find the native version of DMT. Instead they run into very potent shrooms, which they started eating on daily basis in increasing doses until they become telephatic...

Terence later came up with the stoned ape theory which argued, that the evolutionary leap of mankind was not caused by a monolith but psilocybin. It’s a good theory.

 

[moreorless87]

Got around to ordering it on Bluray yesterday so hopefully should watch in sometime early next week.

 

[LHWBelt]

I got me a few rambles here. I dont know nothing about amazonian culture which i guess is part of the point. I enjoyed Karamakate very much though. That was the main draw to the movie for me for sure, the culture clash and the different ways he perceived things than the two white guys he led. (For the record I got confused for a bit as well as a previous poster who didn't know they were different fellas). Anyways their journey to find the healing plant was pretty irrelevant to me and parts of the movie didn't flow well (the messiah part for instance). Still I really liked Karamakate's take on things and his attitude both as a young man and as one who felt he lost his way. The whole time though I was wanting to learn more about the Amazonian's and their culture and such and almost would have rather watched a documentary on the subject.

 

[Tufts]

This seems relevant to the movie....

""His reckless plans to industrialize the Amazon in concert with Brazilian and international agribusiness and mining sectors will bring untold destruction to the planet's largest rainforest and the communities who call it home and spell disaster for the global climate," Christian Poirier, the program director of Amazon Watch, said in a statement after Bolsonaro's election.

Poirier isn't the only one who's concerned.

"I think we are headed for a very dark period in the history of Brazil," Paulo Artaxo, a climate change researcher at the University of Sao Paulo in Brazil, told Science. "There is no point sugarcoating it. Bolsonaro is the worst thing that could happen for the environment.""

https://www.businessinsider.com/brazil-president-bolsonaro-destroy-the-amazon-2018-10?r=UK&IR=T

 

[GSPSAKU]

I remember this film being one I was supposed to watch a few years ago when it first came out and then it slipped into the back of my mind, sucked into that blackhole. I am glad to see it is the film for this week and I watched it this morning. Here are my rambling thoughts

I really thought Karamakate was the shining light in this film through his superb acting and I really felt for him. The clash between two cultures, an ever progressing white culture and Karamakate's that wanted to preserve what he had. The conflict between the two as well as that of his young self; the desire to save one's culture and people only to see himself as the last lone survivor of his people and another encounter with another "possessive" white man who wanted something that belonged to his people and his world. At first, it's the German Theo looking for this magical plant to save his life and then 30 years later, an American Evan who is really looking for rubber trees. At the root of this, though, is really Karamakate, as he says in the latter part that he is but a hollow man; one who has lost his people, his traditions, his culture, and his way, really.

To me, this film really shows the impact of colonialism and the impact we (or whites) have had on indigenous people and the lush forest and greenery that used to be so pervasive around the world. Greed and destruction, in the name of progress, at all costs and through the lens of Karamakate, we can see what those costs are. This is one of those movies that I will have to watch again and really gather my thoughts as everything is discombobulated and I sort of feel his pain as I always grew up stuck between two worlds as well...

 

[Nailgun]

Nobody embraced any fucking Serpents, what the fuck is this shit...?

Embrace of the Serpent is an almost magical experience. It's difficult to put down in words what it did well, it just worked, captivated and hypnotized. The jungle itself, plus the Amazon river filmed in black and white was pretty much aesthetically perfect.

In particular I enjoyed the constent threat of violence. Reflecting now whilst I type this, I'm a little uncomfortable finding so many unhappy images from the film so entertaining. As others mentioned above, the film is homage to the world left behind and replaced with concrete.

Whilst I enjoyed the wholly original, simple narrative, there was something missing. I would have preferred more interaction between my boy Karamakate and either of his two pals riding shotgun. Guerra missed a trick by not having his main characters interact and react to each others worldly differences.

Really enjoyed it though, 2 hours flew by. Will have to watch Los Viajes Del Viento and La Sombra Del Caminante.

 

[Tufts]

I remember this film being one I was supposed to watch a few years ago when it first came out and then it slipped into the back of my mind, sucked into that blackhole. I am glad to see it is the film for this week and I watched it this morning. Here are my rambling thoughts

I really thought Karamakate was the shining light in this film through his superb acting and I really felt for him. The clash between two cultures, an ever progressing white culture and Karamakate's that wanted to preserve what he had. The conflict between the two as well as that of his young self; the desire to save one's culture and people only to see himself as the last lone survivor of his people and another encounter with another "possessive" white man who wanted something that belonged to his people and his world. At first, it's the German Theo looking for this magical plant to save his life and then 30 years later, an American Evan who is really looking for rubber trees. At the root of this, though, is really Karamakate, as he says in the latter part that he is but a hollow man; one who has lost his people, his traditions, his culture, and his way, really.

To me, this film really shows the impact of colonialism and the impact we (or whites) have had on indigenous people and the lush forest and greenery that used to be so pervasive around the world. Greed and destruction, in the name of progress, at all costs and through the lens of Karamakate, we can see what those costs are. This is one of those movies that I will have to watch again and really gather my thoughts as everything is discombobulated and I sort of feel his pain as I always grew up stuck between two worlds as well...

I agree.....Did you see my post about what the Brazilian government is planning? It is really stressing me out. There is no way it won't have a horrible impact not only on the environment, but on a lot of the people who are still living in hiding in the jungle

 

[Tufts]

Whilst I enjoyed the wholly original, simple narrative, there was something missing. I would have preferred more interaction between my boy Karamakate and either of his two pals riding shotgun. Guerra missed a trick by not having his main characters interact and react to each others worldly differences.

The only place we saw this really was in the interactions between Karamakate and Manduca where Karamakate hated on Manduca for dressing like a white man and selling out. Theo saved Manduca though, so of course he was loyal to the man who became his friend.

 

[europe1]

While not the type of film I'd go looking to be entertained by, it was a Helluva flick.

Who are you!? Where is the real Cubo! What have you done with him!

Got a little dark there when faux-Jesus got cannibalized.

He wanted to be the saviour of the Indians.

What's better than saving someone's hunger?

It forced me to confront my own shortcomings when I realized that the main protagonist in the film was Karamakate and not the white actors. It was a real moment for me when I finally understood that the young man in the first scenes was the old man in the later ones. Prior to this, I thought that we were dealing with flashbacks, and that both of the bearded white men were the same man. I was being Eurocentric in my viewing about a film of the Amazon. It was a big fail on my part. And I wasn’t under the influence of anything, except conditioning of who has traditionally been the main character in a film. This was a powerful moment for me. I consider myself to be very open minded and woke. I sure wasn’t when I was watching the first half of this film. If this self-awareness was all I got out of it, it would have been enough to make the film worth watching.

I didn't really get this impression. With Karamakate being on the poster, the camera focusing on Karamakate when he first meets Theodore, and them mentioning Evan and Theodore's names.

That said, the best (and funniest) example of this "mighty whitey" trope, is easily Big Trouble in Little China, where the white protagonists is constantly presented as the stalwart hero, but based on actions it's pretty clear the Asian side-kick is the more competent martial artists and the protagonist is basically the comedic sidekick.

His village had almost been annihilated by either the rubber barons or the Peruvians, and he was forced to flee and live by himself. He is resentful towards white men because he has seen the destruction they have wrought. The clash of beliefs between cultures was evident to the young shaman, and he struggled with the importance of educating the white man about indigenous culture. He intuited that understanding would help prevent continued destruction. Yet he also seemed to realize this was all based on hope. Reality at that point had not given him much to look forward to. He tries to teach the explorers to listen. It was particularly poignant when he says: Listen. The river will tell you how to row. He lectures both explorers about how possessions have no value to the point where he throws Evan’s trunks overboard. He laughs at money. It is nothing but soggy paper. He is belligerent and difficult, yet he agrees to help Theo if it means finding remaining members of his tribe. It would have been easy, and traditional, to paint Karamakate as a one-dimensional figure, the cartoonish angry native, so it was truly gratifying to see his character fleshed out with a sense of humor. There are several scenes where he is in stitches over Theo, whether it be his rowing or his sentimentality in the letter to his wife.

To expand on Karamakate character development...

Karamakate's resentfulness has isolated him from other Indians. When they arrive at the village, Theodore is hailed as a friend, while they are quite cold towards him. Manduca also says that Theodore has done more for them than Karamakate has ever had.

Young Karamakate then damns Theo when he destroys the Yakruna. He sees what the whites have done to his people and his sacred plant, and he allows his rage to extend to Theo. Despite the fact that Theo, fundamentally, is a well-meaning guy... unlike Evan.

Evan reveals to him that he intends to use the plant for rubber development. Despite that, old Karamakate still administers the Yakruna-plant to him, allowing him to have the sacred hallucinogenic experiences, hoping that it will change and teach Evan. Something he didn't do for Theo, even though Theo never betrayed him like Evan did.

Young Karamakate allows his rage to extend to everyone. He sees all white people as fundamentally unchangeable, wrong-thinking, and destructive, even people like Theo who almost disproves him. Old Karamakate, however, seems to believe people can change. Evan betrayed him like Theo never did, still he gets to experience the holy plant. His life-experiences has made him open up and see individuals more for what they are.

We see the impact isolation had on him when 40 years later he describes himself as a chullachaqui, a hollow man. He has lost his memories, his identity, his past. It is absolutely heartwrenching when he asks himself: What have I become?

One thing I was wondering...

Initially, we get the impression that he has become a chullachaqui because of isolationism and dementia.

However, is his despair actually because what happened to his people? He finds his people, but they have become degenerates, their entire culture debased. The Yakruna-plant which was previously sacred to them, is now drunk as a simple party-drug, something you do to get high. For Karamakate, finding out that they were all dead would probably have been less painful than finding out they had betrayed their past.

So is his challachanqui-ess because of his isolationism or because of what happened to his people? The movie never really elaborates on this. But it seems like a possible, even likely, scenario.

And memory is certainly a theme in this movie. We hear Theo say about his possessions “They are not just things. They are my bond to Germany. They are the proof of my studies. Nobody will believe me without them.” It is ironic that it was his diaries that allowed this movie to be made as he died in the jungle. Karamakate tried to keep his memories alive by recording images on the wall, and it wasn’t enough. He had to journey back to remember.

To me, that seemed more like a message that what we value as a culture is relative. Due to the socioeconomic conditions of Westerners, documents are naturally considered holy to us because of how we live. While for an Indian, papper are so foreign to their living-conditions that they have no value. The message isn't that the Indian way is "superior" or that the Western one is "superior. The message is more that what we value is relative to what culture we've brought up in.

Second, when they come back to the same mission,

So... are those fanatics supposed to be the same youths Karamakate fist encountered? We get no inclination of this except that it's the same place they visit.

If it is... that would be pretty daming to Karamakate's urging to not allow them to forget their songs.

I found the moment with the compass and the tribe to be interesting. The compass represented progress, and the tribe wanted to keep it, not because it represented progress, but probably because it was something knew and different that they say Theo valuing. Theo felt helpless and afraid without it. I felt he disguised this fear behind rhetoric when he said that keeping the compass would hurt the tribe as they would loose their traditional way of navigating. That in itself is a very condescending statement

Really? I felt that was a genuine concern from Theo's part.

He's an anthropologist. All his actions seem to be well-meaning towards the natives. Manduca even backs him up his character on this. If they learned to navigate by a compass, there is a real concern that they would forget their aboriginal way of navigating, using their intuition towards the elements. Especially since he explained how it works.

To me, the brilliance of the scene is more Karamakate's counter-argument "People have a right to knowlage."

Karamakate has no problem with this. People have a right to new knowlage, knowlage is something that should be shared. Living in the jungle is a matter of survival against the elements, so sharing knowlage is important to do, since it improves the survivability of everyone.

Theo -- meanwhile -- with his anthropologist mindset, thinks it more important to "preserve" the tribes way of living, than teaching them new skills. He is deadset on not influencing the Indians to much, while Karamakate has the Indian mindset about survavability.

How do you study other cultures without changing them? I always ascribed to the belief that you can’t.

In a human-to-human meeting, I agree that you simply cannot avoid changing them. Just arriving there as a foreginer informs the natives that the world is a lot bigger and nuanced than they thought it was. There is a cosmos outside their riverbed.

However, influence is done by degrees. Theo would have influenced their culture waaaay more if he left that compass behind. Taking it away was damage-control.

I did wonder why the film was filmed in black and white. It would have been incredibly green otherwise. Was it to make the hallucinations stand out at the end? Was it to give that sense that our realities are limited by our perceptions?

Yeah!

I mean, it's a jungle, it's verdant lushness is a real spectable and brings plenty of character.

I've heard some directors say that black-and-white makes people focus more on people's faces and expressions since there isn't any other stimuli. The starkness of it narrows the focus. So maybe the director wanted us to focus more on the characters than the jungle?

It made me think of a Joe Rogan podcast where he interviewed Michael Pollan about hallucinogens and how they open our brains up to experiences and connections we cannot have otherwise.

I've always found it weird that drug-enthustiasts say that drugs "opens our brain".

Isn't it imposing things on your brain? You introduce a foregin substance that messes with your nerves and synapses. To me, that seems not so much as "opens us" as it is manipulating your brain.

 

[LHWBelt]

Who are you!? Where is the real Cubo! What have you done with him!



He wanted to be the saviour of the Indians.

What's better than saving someone's hunger?



I didn't really get this impression. With Karamakate being on the poster, the camera focusing on Karamakate when he first meets Theodore, and them mentioning Evan and Theodore's names.

That said, the best (and funniest) example of this "mighty whitey" trope, is easily Big Trouble in Little China, where the white protagonists is constantly presented as the stalwart hero, but based on actions it's pretty clear the Asian side-kick is the more competent martial artists and the protagonist is basically the comedic sidekick.

To expand on Karamakate character development...

Karamakate's resentfulness has isolated him from other Indians. When they arrive at the village, Theodore is hailed as a friend, while they are quite cold towards him. Manduca also says that Theodore has done more for them than Karamakate has ever had.

Young Karamakate then damns Theo when he destroys the Yakruna. He sees what the whites have done to his people and his sacred plant, and he allows his rage to extend to Theo. Despite the fact that Theo, fundamentally, is a well-meaning guy... unlike Evan.

Evan reveals to him that he intends to use the plant for rubber development. Despite that, old Karamakate still administers the Yakruna-plant to him, allowing him to have the sacred hallucinogenic experiences, hoping that it will change and teach Evan. Something he didn't do for Theo, even though Theo never betrayed him like Evan did.

Young Karamakate allows his rage to extend to everyone. He sees all white people as fundamentally unchangeable, wrong-thinking, and destructive, even people like Theo who almost disproves him. Old Karamakate, however, seems to believe people can change. Evan betrayed him like Theo never did, still he gets to experience the holy plant. His life-experiences has made him open up and see individuals more for what they are.



One thing I was wondering...

Initially, we get the impression that he has become a chullachaqui because of isolationism and dementia.

However, is his despair actually because what happened to his people? He finds his people, but they have become degenerates, their entire culture debased. The Yakruna-plant which was previously sacred to them, is now drunk as a simple party-drug, something you do to get high. For Karamakate, finding out that they were all dead would probably have been less painful than finding out they had betrayed their past.

So is his challachanqui-ess because of his isolationism or because of what happened to his people? The movie never really elaborates on this. But it seems like a possible, even likely, scenario.



To me, that seemed more like a message that what we value as a culture is relative. Due to the socioeconomic conditions of Westerners, documents are naturally considered holy to us because of how we live. While for an Indian, papper are so foreign to their living-conditions that they have no value. The message isn't that the Indian way is "superior" or that the Western one is "superior. The message is more that what we value is relative to what culture we've brought up in.



So... are those fanatics supposed to be the same youths Karamakate fist encountered? We get no inclination of this except that it's the same place they visit.

If it is... that would be pretty daming to Karamakate's urging to not allow them to forget their songs.



Really? I felt that was a genuine concern from Theo's part.

He's an anthropologist. All his actions seem to be well-meaning towards the natives. Manduca even backs him up his character on this. If they learned to navigate by a compass, there is a real concern that they would forget their aboriginal way of navigating, using their intuition towards the elements. Especially since he explained how it works.

To me, the brilliance of the scene is more Karamakate's counter-argument "People have a right to knowlage."

Karamakate has no problem with this. People have a right to new knowlage, knowlage is something that should be shared. Living in the jungle is a matter of survival against the elements, so sharing knowlage is important to do, since it improves the survivability of everyone.

Theo -- meanwhile -- with his anthropologist mindset, thinks it more important to "preserve" the tribes way of living, than teaching them new skills. He is deadset on not influencing the Indians to much, while Karamakate has the Indian mindset about survavability.



In a human-to-human meeting, I agree that you simply cannot avoid changing them. Just arriving there as a foreginer informs the natives that the world is a lot bigger and nuanced than they thought it was. There is a cosmos outside their riverbed.

However, influence is done by degrees. Theo would have influenced their culture waaaay more if he left that compass behind. Taking it away was damage-control.



Yeah!

I mean, it's a jungle, it's verdant lushness is a real spectable and brings plenty of character.

I've heard some directors say that black-and-white makes people focus more on people's faces and expressions since there isn't any other stimuli. The starkness of it narrows the focus. So maybe the director wanted us to focus more on the characters than the jungle?



I've always found it weird that drug-enthustiasts say that drugs "opens our brain".

Isn't it imposing things on your brain? You introduce a foregin substance that messes with your nerves and synapses. To me, that seems not so much as "opens us" as it is manipulating your brain.

Im too drunk 4 this. I tried reading it mate

 

[Cubo de Sangre]

Who are you!? Where is the real Cubo! What have you done with him!

I really enjoyed the themes. Sue me.

To me, the brilliance of the scene is more Karamakate's counter-argument "People have a right to knowlage."

Karamakate has no problem with this. People have a right to new knowlage, knowlage is something that should be shared. Living in the jungle is a matter of survival against the elements, so sharing knowlage is important to do, since it improves the survivability of everyone.

To this film is rife with juxtaposition and conflicts. K seems to lament the loss of his own culture and wants to preserve it. But the only way to keep a culture from changing is to disallow the advancement of technology. The right to knowledge and technology is in conflict with preservation of culture. Take the Amish for example.

I've always found it weird that drug-enthustiasts say that drugs "opens our brain".

Isn't it imposing things on your brain? You introduce a foregin substance that messes with your nerves and synapses. To me, that seems not so much as "opens us" as it is manipulating your brain.

Think of it like ruts in a road. Sometimes the ruts get too deep and need evened out. That's what something like mushrooms or LSD will do. The drugs "mess with" neurons and shit in the brain by making new connections that allow your thinking to get out of its ruts.

https://www.webmd.com/depression/news/20171013/can-magic-mushrooms-kick-start-depression-help#1

Still, brain scans before and after treatment suggest psilocybin may reset the activity of brain circuits that play a role in depression.

"Several of our patients described feeling 'reset' after the treatment and often used computer analogies," Carhart-Harris reported in a college news release. One said he felt like his brain had been "defragged" like a computer hard drive, and another said he felt "rebooted," the researcher added.

"Psilocybin may be giving these individuals the temporary 'kick-start' they need to break out of their depressive states, and these imaging results do tentatively support a 'reset' analogy. Similar brain effects to these have been seen with electroconvulsive therapy," Carhart-Harris said.

 

[Tufts]

I didn't really get this impression. With Karamakate being on the poster, the camera focusing on Karamakate when he first meets Theodore, and them mentioning Evan and Theodore's names.

I didn't look at the poster. I noticed Karamakate was shown first, but from behind as the others swam up, so he was kinda part of the scenery. My head was just too far up my butt

 

[Rimbaud82]

Sorry lads been busy, in work now, shall be round tomorrow with my thoughts on my choice lol

 

[Tufts]

So is his challachanqui-ess because of his isolationism or because of what happened to his people? The movie never really elaborates on this. But it seems like a possible, even likely, scenario.

I think it is both. Isolation will drive one to madness. Thinking your are the last man in your tribe would be so hard to accept, you would really want to be able to escape that. And the pain of realizing that he is in fact alone because the few that were left had sold themselves out would have been devastating and left him without hope. He truly believed in his tribe's traditions, in the old ways, in the holiness of the plant, so being the last person who he perceived felt that way would be enough to make him shut down. The older actor did an amazing job of showing his mental weakness and cloudiness.

 

[Tufts]

So... are those fanatics supposed to be the same youths Karamakate fist encountered? We get no inclination of this except that it's the same place they visit.

If it is... that would be pretty daming to Karamakate's urging to not allow them to forget their songs.

I wondered this too. Do you remember during the beating scene that the camera focused in on one of the boys standing off to the side watching? I interpreted that as this boy betrayed the other boys (and by extension the tribe) when he ratted them out to the priest. I wondered if he might have become the Jesus, but I don't think so, because Jesus was pretty fair skinned. I also think Jesus was speaking Portuguese at one point, so I thought he might be a Brazilian missionary who found the opportunity to essentially create his own little cult with himself at the helm.

 

[Rimbaud82]

So obviously I am a huge fan of this film, and I am glad I have finally managed to get people to watch to it lol. And I am equally glad pretty much every seems to have enjoyed it.

I love this film because of the way it takes on the 'journey down river' story, particularly the likes of Fitzcarraldo and Aguirre but inverts the narrative. Those films tackle some of the horrors of colonialism, but it is from a white characters point of view, and often the Amazon is reduced to nothing more than a place where Europeans go mad (although a different river, this is also a criticism levelled at Conrad's Heart of Darkness). In Embrace of the Serpent the focus is shifted to be from the perspective of the indigenous populations themselves (through Karamakate's story). Although personally I thought it was a tad baffling that @Tufts did not realise that Karamakate was the main protagonist until a good portion into the film the fact that she was forced to confront her own 'eurocentrism' is one of the key points of the film, so that's a good thing!

Tufts got there first so I am just responding to those points which were raised first lol. I am not sure if you are meant to experience confusion over the actual appearances of Evan and Theo, I don't think they look that similar and it's clearly a number of years later. However, although not physically, there is certainly the suggestion of some kind of spiritual connection between the two men. That is why Karamakate refers to them as if they are the same person at several points, and why at the end he claims that he had already killed Evan - "I killed you too...before, in time without time, yesterday, 40 years, maybe 100, a million years ago'. He killed Theo, or let him die, by burning the Yakruna and not allowing him to cure himself. This connection was based on something in Schultes diaries I remember reading in an interview when the film first came out, there was an Amazonian people that he visited who had turned Theodor Koch-Grünberg's earlier visit into part of their mythology and they believed that Schultes was the same man.

The film is, of course, very critical of the institutions of European Colonialism - the evils of the Rubber plantation and the destructive impact of the Church on local cultures and traditions. It is very sad to think of all the local knowledge, traditions, stories and so on that were destroyed. Essentially that's the crux of the film, the loss of native cultures.

Though there are shades of grey there too. Theo doesn't want to give those people the compass because once they learn, the native knowledge will be lost. In a sense, although he is right and has fundamentally noble aims to study the peoples there, he is acting within a colonial mindset, he seemingly falls into the trap of the 'noble savage'. Young Karamakate says that "Knowledge belongs to all men". Of course, this adds to the sad irony that when he is older his isolation and fading memory has meant that he has forgotten much of his native knowledge. However, old Karamakate lets Evan try the medora caapi despite the fact that he was trying to find the plant for selfish, economic reasons and had been lying through his teeth all along. That's because, like others have said, we have witnessed the transformation of Karamakate from an angry young man who was resentful of any Whites, to a wiser old man who now sees that Manduca was right, with the world of the Amazon now irreparably altered by European Colonialism, the only way to ensure that some record of his peoples beliefs survives within this new context is to 'get the whites to learn'. In real life, the actual Richard Evans Schultes went from being a field agent for the Rubber Development Corportation to co-authoring a book with Albert Hoffman (the man who first synthesised LSD) entitled Plants of the Gods: Origins of Hallucinogenic Use. It is only through the writings of men like Theodor Koch-Grünberg and Richard Evans-Schultes that we can see native cultures as something valuable, rather than dismissing them as savage cannibals as people used to.

Visually I love this film too, the choice to shoot in 35mm rather than digital really makes the black and white look extremely sharp. Apparently part of that was simply physical, they needed a camera that was rugged enough to survive the rigours of the Amazon. I see people (@Tufts again) mention the choice of black and white as well actually, Guerra has said that there were a few reasons behind it. Firstly, to capture something of the old photos taken by the initial explorers. The second was that he felt there was no way to really capture the actual greenness of the Amazon, so by shooting in black and white it would give the impression that this is not the real Amazon, but an "imagined Amazon", a kind of dreamscape which would be more real than what they could actually portray otherwise. I think it looks incredible, so I am glad they opted for b&w.

Of course, the sudden shift to colour during the final 'psychedelic' scene is also more impactful after we have been 'starved' of colour for the rest of the film. In that sense it seems to be drawing influence from two things in my opinion. Obviously the actual sequence itself bears more than a passing resemblance to the 'stargate' sequence from Kubrick's 2001, while the overall effect of black and white for the whole film suddenly shifting into bright colour made me think of the religious epiphany at the end of Tarkovskys Andrei Rublev.

All in all, I love this film and think it's a modern masterpiece.

 

[Rimbaud82]

I wondered this too. Do you remember during the beating scene that the camera focused in on one of the boys standing off to the side watching? I interpreted that as this boy betrayed the other boys (and by extension the tribe) when he ratted them out to the priest. I wondered if he might have become the Jesus, but I don't think so, because Jesus was pretty fair skinned. I also think Jesus was speaking Portuguese at one point, so I thought he might be a Brazilian missionary who found the opportunity to essentially create his own little cult with himself at the helm.

I took that to just be that they had internalised the priest's violent methods, and now have some fucked up bastardised version of Christianity predicated on violence etc. So we see them whipping themselves at one point, they had grown up watching the priest whipping as punishment and I think the focus on the boy watching is just meant to show how they had become accustomed to those punishments? Could be wrong of course.