Review on “Amazonia - The Awakening of Florestania” (2018) by Christiane Torloni and Miguel Przewodo

To a Brazilian blog called ConversaCult.

When I was a kid, I used to travel with my family across the country. One day we were driving into Regência (ES) and found an extension of the Tamar Project -- a Brazilian conservation project, which helps preserve of endangered sea turtles. At the time, my father was studying biology and the person responsible for the project said that the turtles would be born the next day. My parents got us a place to spend the night and, at first light, we went to the beach. That day I saw turtles coming out of the sand and meeting the raging sea of Regência. When I saw that most of them came close to the edge of the sea doing somersaults, unable to get out of that position, I ran out to help the poor turtles get home. I also remember that one day we arrived at a random city in Bahia and there was an indigenous tribe. We went there, visited and met some natives. They have a great importance not only to maintain their traditional livelihoods, but to also safeguard the global-scale environmental benefits provided by their territory and other tribes. That type of experience for me was one of the most fascinating things as 5 year-old curious girl. These trips led me to have a great connection with nature. I still don't know if I believe in God, but I can say that I believe in Nature. In its strength, determination, uniqueness and focus. Nature always knows what to do. Where, when, how and why. It survives by resisting. If the man builds a stone jungle, nature comes in and decorates it in green, yellow, brown, as if to remind us that it is the one that always prevails, and we are just passing through this world.

I met the actor Christiane Torloni at Café Literário in 2007, where she spoke about the environment and sustainability. I had always admired her for her strength, talent, determination and uniqueness and she seemed to be ten feet tall, an untouchable being. After that, she also became someone I respected for being concerned about something I thought was fundamental to human existence.

Curiously, a few years later Christiane announced that she was going to make a documentary about the Amazon. Perhaps, this was the film that had waited for my whole life. A documentary directed by someone that I admire and about a subject I have a huge interest in. Those years passed and while Christiane Torloni came and went from the Amazon, I came and went from the College where I was studying Cinema. During the five years of education, I discovered that making and producing movies was not easy. During that time, Christiane also learned that lesson. The Amazon is resistance.

Cinema is resistance. I had the pleasure of watching the film “Amazonia - The Awakening of Florestania” at the 2018 Rio Festival and that is exactly what this documentary is about. Resistance. The fight for what we believe and what we love. So many people speak and are remembered in this documentary that you wonder when in your primary education you stopped hearing about Marechal Rondon, Chico Mendez and Darcy Ribeiro. Even about people who try their best in the current (dark) days we live in and don't have the notoriety they deserve.

Seeing on the big screen that since the Military Dictatorship people didn't care about preserving the environment is extremely discouraging.. It is horrible to think that people put profit, money and capitalism above anything that is sustainable and will make the world a better place. After all, if there is no environment how will human beings be able to live? It is quite shocking to watch images of forest fires, illegal logging and the construction of Belo Monte, in the Xingu National Park, on a large screen. It is frightening to see that it all happens right under our noses and we have never done anything and many of us, perhaps, never will. In Brazil, we have the construction of the largest hydroelectric power plant in the world, which threatens the lives of riverside families and ecosystems in the region. It is too frightening that we are in 2020 and the discussion about clean energy is yet on the table and not a functioning reality. Agriculture and cattle breeding are also incredibly harmful to the Amazon. Farmers deforest to grow cleared soybeans to export or to feed the cattle that goes to slaughter aimed towards exportation.

The sad reality of our forest is deforestation to support other countries. To what extent will our country, our government, allow the extinction of an ecosystem for profit instead of caring for the millions of people who live here?

Obviously, money is important. However, have you ever thought that if the forest ends there will be absolutely nothing left, including water? What is even sadder is that we’ve been going down this path for a few years now and nobody seems to care. “Every Brazilian should visit the Amazon at least once in their life”, says Christiane Torloni in the documentary. I believe that if you can't go to the Amazon, at least try to reconnect and go to any park you have in your city. Spend a few hours there listening to what Nature has to say, if you are willing, I am sure you will hear a cry for help from someone who is surviving with the help of devices and realize that the only solution is awareness. The documentary is a punch in the gut of any viewer. It was a necessary film at the time it was released, and it is still today due to all the environmental crimes that happen daily in Brazil. It serves to raise awareness that if we don't open our eyes now, in thirty years or less, maybe we won't have anything else. The funny thing is that in the Constitution, which was so talked about in recent years, Article 225 says that every citizen has the right to an ecologically balanced environment and it is up to the government and the citizens to defend and preserve it for present and future generations. Now, if we defend the Constitution so much, why don't we enforce what is written in it? Why don't we demand what's rightfully ours? This is where ecology mixes with politics. We cannot allow those we give, literally, our vote of confidence to the luxury of pretending our desires do not exist. Pretend that Brazil is just a big lawn for agribusiness and cattle to grazes. The documentary shows this forgetfulness of the population is an old issue, prioritizing health and education as the greatest goods that exists in this country and when asked about the Amazon the answers are something similar to: "that’s not our priority, maybe in the next manifestation". I must paraphrase one of the most beautiful and striking things that I heard in this documentary: "I wonder when we forgot that the name of this country is the name of a tree. What runs in our veins is not blood, it’s ssap.”.

And then I ask you: when did we let this all happen to our forest? When did we close our eyes to the genocide of natives. When did we allow our rulers to turn a blind eye to what happens?

In fact, now the question is different: How long until we run out of time?