Death is an intimate experience, and how we lay our loved ones to rest, varies between cultures. KAPU: Sacred Hawaiian Burials sheds light on the ongoing battle by Native Hawaiians to protect burial sites across the state and the iwi, or sacred bones, that are within them.
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Andean communities fight to protect their water from contamination by mining companies.
Act of War: The Overthrow of the Hawaiian Nation (1993)
This hour-long documentary is a provocative look at a historical event of which few Americans are aware. In mid-January, 1893, armed troops from the U.S.S Boston landed at Honolulu in support of a treasonous coup d’état against the constitutional sovereign of the Hawaiian Kingdom, Queen Lili‘uokalani. The event was described by U.S. President Grover Cleveland as an "act of war."
Xondaros - Guarani Resistance (2023)
The 6 Guarani villages of Jaraguá, in São Paulo, fight for land rights, for human rights and for the preservation of nature. They suffer from the proximity to the city, which brings lack of resources, pollution of rivers and springs, racism, police violence, fires, lack of infrastructure and sanitation, among others. Unable to live like their ancestors, their millenary culture is lost as it merges with the urban culture.
Shipibo Konibo: A Rite of Passage (2005)
In Peruvian Amazonia, for the first time in many years, a Shipibo–Konibo community prepare to perform the Aneshiati ceremony: a time of dance, song, festive clothing, and drink—including the sacred tea ayahuasca.
Holo Mai Pele (2001)
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Tóxico, Texaco, Tóxico (2007)
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Like a Mighty Wave (2019)
On Wednesday, July 17th 2019, a heavily armed police force arrested 36 Native Hawaiian kūpuna peacefully protecting Maunakea from desecration. The actions from that day sparked an international outcry and brought new life to the ongoing movement for Native Hawaiians’ rights for self-determination.
Mauna Kea: Temple Under Siege (2005)
Although the mountain volcano Mauna Kea last erupted around 4,000 years ago, it is still hot today, the center of a burning controversy over whether its summit should be used for astronomical observatories or preserved as a cultural landscape sacred to the Hawaiian people. For five years the documentary production team Nā Maka o ka 'Āina ("the eyes of the land") captured on video the seasonal moods of Mauna Kea's unique 14,000-foot summit, the richly varied ecosystems that extend from sea level to alpine zone, the legends and stories that reveal the mountain's geologic and cultural history, and the political turbulence surrounding the efforts to protect the most significant temple in the islands: the mountain itself.
This Is the Way We Rise (2021)
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Nostalgia for the Lake (2023)
A vision from Limbo, where the canoeist of the eternal lake floats in his boat, between sleep and wakefulness. When he sleeps, he dreams of the everyday of a parallel time. when he wakes up, the same song haunts him again and again. his boat, “ara” (time, in guarani) travels through time like a shooting star.
The Rebellion of Memory (2020)
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Revealed: How to Poison a Planet (2024)
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American Aloha: Hula Beyond Hawai'i (2003)
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The Medicine of Forgiveness (2001)
Benito Arévalo is an onaya: a traditional healer in a Shipibo-Konibo community in Peruvian Amazonia. He explains something of the onaya tradition, and how he came to drink the plant medicine ayahuasca under his father's tutelage. Arévalo leads an ayahuasca ceremony for Westerners, and shares with us something of his understanding of the plants and the onaya tradition.