Review of 'We are guardians': efforts on the ground to save the Amazon

Sometimes it is easy to forget that, together with everything else that his news brain is filling at this time, deforestation in the Amazon remains a massive crisis for the planet, one that is quickly reaching a point of non -return with respect to our ability to reduce its terrible impact.

The films love superheroes who face their villains with arrogance of great stage. But the documentaries thrive in the helpless and when it comes to facing illegal felling and mining that flatten the leafy canopy of South America, indigenous peoples have shown more than their worth against chainsaws of buzzing or humming politicians. The energy shipment “We are guardians” of the directors Edivan Guajajara, Chelsea Greene and Rob Grobman, is the last defense feature to take the cameras to the Amazon to juxtapose the beauty and devastation, as well as a battle of David vs. Goliath as experienced in the field.

We meet the man of a soft voice Marҫal, from the indigenous territory of Araboia, whose group of decades of “forestry guardians” organized, unpaid, trained with weapons and painted with the face leads the fight directly to the woods, where they can approach them, with a great risk of their lives. Protecting water, trees and wildlife in the region, it also shows concern that the unworthy peoples of the Amazon also remain free of interference.

Meanwhile, the Pyr activist treated the Territory Alto Río Guama is working hard to take more indigenous women in politics and in the power seats: a last moment at the same time (the filming took place between 2019 and 2022) when the Brazilian president of the agribusiness is rapidly, Jair Bolsonaro, openly tried the rights of indigenous people such as dismissed and an ascent. As I treated, reforestation of the mind and heart is needed to catalyze progress.

These dedicated warriors certainly gain our admiration in the good/evil binary of the conflict, but the complications help to give the documentary form, as in the attention given a crunchy wood called Valdir, who agreed to appear in the camera. A wood for more than 50 years since he was 8 years old, knows exactly what is wrong with his work, but is caught in the jaws of an industry as a means of survival for his family. Even a rich landowner can leave as a victim here, as is the case of Tadeu, a businessman who in the 1990s began an ecological sanctuary in his 28,000 hectares, and whose complaints to the Brazilian government about the illegal invasion in his lands fall into deaf ears.

There is exhaustivity about how “we are guardians” presents a great and nudous problem of the environment, politics, geography and business, internationalized but hyperlocal, while highlighting indigenous efforts of recoil. But the miniature portrait style of the film did not always fit perfectly with the other elements: the discharge of facts, obtaining those drone shots and projecting a thriller atmosphere. Arriving immediately after the aesthetically acute and immersive “territory” of a couple of years ago (which covers part of the same land), “we are guardians” feels more like a highlight of problems than a documentary trip that takes you somewhere.

But sometimes, it is what comes out the message, right? When it comes to climate change, our media diet is hungry. So, if you need that update course in the importance of saving the Amazon, “we are guardians”, as a well -made brochure, does the job with great efficiency and heat.