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Exclusive: New York-based arthouse distributor KimStim has acquired North American rights to feature-doc The Falling Sky, about the threat to the existence of the Amazonian Yanomami people, ahead of its screening in Doc NYC next month.

The immersive and poetic film centers on iconic shaman Davi Kopenawa and the Yanomami community. It is based on the book of the same title by Kopenawa and French anthropologist Bruce Albert and is co-directed by Eryk Rocha & Gabriela Carneiro da Cunha.

Narrated by Kopenawa, the doc traces the preparations of his Indigenous community of Watorikɨ as it engages in a funeral rite known as the Reahu, which is a collective effort to hold up the sky and prevent it from falling. This ceremony also galvanizes the community in its battle to defend their homeland from illegal gold mining.

KimStim’s co-president Ian Stimler negotiated the deal with China-based international sales agent Rediance.

The...

Two Brazilian films with a successful career on the international festival circuit shared the main prize at the 26th edition of Rio de Janeiro International Film Festival (Festival do Rio) on Sunday night (October 13).

In a tie, Marcelo Caetano’s Baby and Pedro Freire’s Malu have won the best fiction feature award from Premiere Brazil, the main competition section which screened more than 50 local films this year.

In addition to the biggest prize, Baby won in two more categories at the Redentor awards ceremony at the historic Cine Odeon Cclsr in downtown Rio de Janeiro. The queer drama about...

If you’re expecting to ride out the apocalypse in a deluxe bunker, you might want to consider the visionary wisdom of Yanomami shaman Davi Kopenawa, a central figure in The Falling Sky. “When the earth transforms,” he says at one point in the documentary, “you can have all the money you want. You can run away with the money, but when the stormy winds come, you won’t be able to silence them.”

Filled with beauty and fury, the film offers an immersive portrait of an endangered community. The specifics are those of the Yanomami people: their struggle to maintain a way of life in sync with nature, and to withstand invading forces of greed and commerce that treat nature as a source of wealth to be plundered. But the calamity that Kopenawa warns of is a global one. We’re in this together, and, if the looting of the planet continues unabated,...

For about the first hour of their documentary “The Falling Sky,” Brazilian directors Eryk Rocha and Gabriela Carneiro da Cunha introduce us to the traditions and ongoing plight of the Yanomami Indigenous people — namely, fending off invaders — without making their presence known. There are no title cards stating where we are and why, and the only voiceover we hear comes directly from the Yanomami, most often Davi Kopenawa, their current leader and co-author of a 2010 book bearing the same title as the film.

But then, following a hypnotic ritual under the night’s sky, Justino Yanomami, an elderly Yanomami, retells the tragedy of his first encounter with white missionaries and the violence and disease they spread in their Amazonian land. With his face illuminated by a raging fire, an emotional Justino looks directly into the lens, directly at the filmmakers and at us, and asks, “Are you really going to be our allies?...

Brazilian directors’ Eryk Rocha and Gabriela Carneiro da Cunha’s “The Falling Sky” delves into lives of the Amazonian Yanomami people, who live in the heart of the Amazon rainforest where they are contending with a harsh humanitarian crisis caused by the massive invasion of wildcat miners searching for gold and cassiterite, a mineral used in electronics. This unique doc – which launches in Directors Fortnight – is inspired by the thoughts, expressed in an eponymous book, of Davi Kopenawa, a shaman and spokesman for the Yanomami who performs the reahu ritual, a collective ceremony to hold up the sky and prevent it from falling.

The directors spoke in unison to Variety about why the Yanomami’s struggle against miners transcends the woes of their land and how their cosmology can help heal our planet as a whole.

What drew you to this project?

In the book Davi Kopenawa says that it...

Chinese sales agent Rediance has boarded Ben Rivers’ upcoming documentary Bogancloch, a sequel to 2011’s award-winning Two Years At Sea.

Nestled in a vast highland forest in Scotland, Bogancloch is where modern day hermit Jake Williams lives his solitary life. It mark the second film in which UK filmmaker Rivers follows Williams, charting a subtly changing life in a radically changing world. It is told in an elliptical, non-expositional way, creating space for the viewer to read the film openly.

China-based Rediance has secured worldwide rights, excluding the UK and Germany.

Rivers has made around 40 short and feature length films...

China-based international sales agent Rediance has acquired world sales rights to “The Falling Sky,” a feature documentary which will premiere next month at Cannes in the Directors Fortnight section. Directed by Eryk Rocha and Gabriela Carneiro da Cunha, the film makes the Amazonian Yanomami people its stars.

Based on the book of the same title by shaman and Yanomami leader Davi Kopenawa and French anthropologist Bruce Albert, “The Falling Sky” portrays the indigenous community of Watorikɨ as it engages in a funeral rite known as the reahu, which is a collective effort to hold up the sky and prevent it from falling.

The film stands as a trenchant shamanic critique of the destruction of the Yanomami’s way of life caused by the intrusions of the napë, the white prospectors and the so-called civilized world into the Yanomami territory.

“The spellbinding images, meticulous sound design, and powerful words of Davi...

The Cannes Directors’ Fortnight section has unveiled its lineup for the 2024 festival, which will open with This Life of Mine, the final feature from the late French director Sophie Fillières. The drama features Agnès Jaoui as a woman whose identity starts to unravel when she turns 55. Fillières died shortly after wrapping principal photography on the film and her children finished post-production.

There are four U.S. titles in the feature section of the non-competitive sidebar: Tyler Taormina’s Christmas Eve In Miller’s Point, Carson Lund’s Eephus, India Donaldson’s Good One and Gazer from Ryan J. Sloan.

Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point, starring Michael Cera, Elsie Fisher, Francesca Scorsese. Ben Shenkman, Gregg Turkington, Sawyer Spielberg, Maria Dizzia and newcomer Matilda Fleming, follows four generations as they gather for what might be their last Christmas in the family home. Lund, who lensed Christmas Eve, makes his feature debut with Eephus,...

The 77th edition of Cannes’ Directors’ Fortnight will kick off with “This Life of Mine,” a dramedy directed by Sophie Fillières, a renowned French filmmaker who died last year. Presented posthumously, the film is headlined by French stars including Agnès Jaoui, Philippe Katerine and Valérie Donzelli. The independent selection, which has recently gone through a rebranding and is now spearheaded by artistic director Julien Rejl, will close with another French film, Jean-Christophe Meurisse’s “Plastic Guns,” an offbeat crime comedy headlined by popular actor Jonathan Cohen.

The lineup includes as many as four U.S. features, three of which are feature debuts, including India Donaldson’s coming-of-age film”Good One” which premiered at Sundance and garnered solid reviews. Set in upstate New York, “Good One” follows 17-year-old Sam as she joins her father and his oldest friend, Matt, on their annual backpacking trip in the Catskill Mountains. “Good One” has...

Directors’ Fortnight has unveiled the selection for its 56th edition heavy on films from first-time US filmmakers, South American titles, and talent including Isabelle Huppert, Michael Cera and Agnès Jaoui.

Artistic director Julien Rejl revealed the line-up at a press conference in Paris on Tuesday (April 16) for the Cannes parallel section run by French directors guild the Srf.

Scroll down for the full selection

After undergoing a complete rebranding for last year’s edition complete with new artistic director Rejl and a new more inclusive female-forward name in French to La Quinzaine des Cinéastes, this year’s selection includes eight...

Cannes parallel section Directors’ Fortnight has unveiled the line-up for its 56th edition running from May 15 to 23, at a press conference in Paris’ Forum des Images cultural center.

The section, launched in 1969 and overseen by the French Directors Guild, will present 21 feature films and 10 short films.

It is the second line-up overseen by Delegate General Julien Rejl, who took up the role last year.

Discoveries of his inaugural edition included Georgian director Elene Naveriani’s late coming-of-age drama Blackbird Blackbird Blackberry; U.S. indie film Riddle Of Fire by Weston Razooli, as well as Vietnamese filmmaker Phạm Thiên Ân’s 2023 Cannes Caméra d’Or winner Inside The Yellow Cocoon Shell.

The 2024 edition will open with late director Sophie Fillières’ final feature This Life of Mine, starring Agnès Jaoui as a woman whose sense of self starts to unravel as she turns 55.

Fillières died shortly after completing the shoot and her...