ABSTRACT
Perhaps one of the most striking features of Brazilian film culture over the course of the late twentieth and twenty-first centuries thus far is the shift in representation of indigenous peoples on screen. This is partly as a result of the highly regarded initiative Vídeo nas Aldeias (Video in the Villages), to be explored in more detail below, and partly because of greater public awareness and interest in the complex case of indigenous peoples in Brazil and their relation to “the nation”. But the most significant reason for this shift is the growth in grassroots activist movements within indigenous communities themselves from the 1990s onwards (Gleghorn 2017: 169), 1 and the extent to which film has been incorporated into their activist repertoire. Taking advantage in 2000 of the problematic discourse around the “celebration” of Brazil’s 500-year anniversary, high-profile indigenous mobilisations and protests in Brasilia and elsewhere sought to draw attention to the need to retrace indigenous history, and bring indigenous issues to the centre of political debate. But despite these protests the dominant discourse in the audio-visual sphere, in terms of what images and messages are reaching a wide public, continues to be one of a history of harmonious encounter between Brazilian “Indians” and “non-Indians”. 2
