Yarokamena

From the mouth of a descendant, we hear the story of Yarokamena, an Indigenous leader who organised an armed resistance to rubber exploitation in the Amazon.

Merging oral storytelling with the power of cinema, we hear Gerardo Sueche, councillor of the Uitoto peoples, retelling the story of Yarokamena, an Indigenous leader who led an armed resistance to the exploitation of rubber in the Amazon rainforest in the early 1900s. In a modern-day Amazon, invaded by technological ruins and haunted by colonial ghosts, the retelling of Yarokamena’s story invokes the spiritual and cosmic forces of war, staging a new resistance to the continuing practices of exploitation and extraction.

Content Guidance: contains descriptions of rape, murder and torture.

This film will screen as part of the programme Shorts: Resist.