La Terre et la peine

Shot in 1996 in Brazilian Amazonia, the film follows the first steps of a group of moneyless settlers who have come to set down their roots in the heart of the virgin forest. Valfredo and his companion Deusilda reveal to us the inside of a harsh world marked by hope and violence. They want to make a success of their life by settling on newly cleared forest land far from the already settled neighbouring regions where immense stretches of land have been taken over by a few large landowners. Yet on one of these domains, La Bahania has decided to fight with a few hundred families from the ‘Landless Movement’. Occupying the fazenda’s lands, these families are living a precarious existence in their makeshift camp. Shortly before the end of shooting, some of their friends met their death in a confrontation with the Military Police, whilst defending their claims for the land to be redistributed. The film hardly touches on the issue of the forest and deforestation (which is still continuing) quite simply because the poor settlers who have emigrated from the inner regions do not see things in the same light. The problems they encounter and their occasional distress are conveyed through their way of looking at things and their daily lives. We share a closeness to them which enables us to discover a reality that never appears in the ‘exotic’ images of Amazonia. (Frédéric Létang)