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Review: Birdwatchers
Rating: 4/5
Year of production: 2008
Director: Marco Bechis
Shooting a film about an indigenous minority is always going to be a sensitive issue, for the majority of this 108 minute long film, I thought that director, Marco Bechis, had pulled it off. That was until the closing frames in which it simply stated x million native Americans have died in the Amazon since 1500. In an instant, Bechis turned this film from an eye-opening display of cultural interaction to bordering-on propaganda.
The plot of the film revolves around a real-life group of native Amazonians, the Guarani-Kaiowa (so real-life, in fact, that the group were played by the members themselves) However, it is a fictional plot, focusing upon the Guarani’s right to self-determination on their native land and, more strikingly, the suicides committed by the group’s members, seemingly after becoming besotted by the ‘outside’ world.
The Guarani leave their protected reserve after feeling the forest was cursed following the first suicides we witness. They settle illegally upon an agricultural field owned by a not-too-happy non-indigenous farmer. The film then develops showing the varying cultural differences and ways of life for these contrasting peoples as they interact. Quickly setting up the good guy/bad guy dichotomy which is seemingly only resolved through the various sexual escapades between the individuals. Rather than being simply Hollywood sensationalized romps, however, I thought these intimate scenes displayed a human element to both sides, and with it a poignant message that never really came to fruition.
The sting is yet to come, as the inevitable tension begins to surface. The human element dissolves and the shock-horror emerges. Only for Bechis to finish off with a self-righteous plea to protect a people that are at odds with themselves just as they are with the deforestation of their homeland and broader Amazonian politics. The transition of peoples from one area to another, and it’s consequent conflicts, has been the pervasive backdrop in human history, one would hope the viewer would take an informed view before jumping on this rather inviting political bandwagon. This film is brave for the boldness in which it poses this very controversial message, and for that alone it is worth watching.