Marta Rodríguez and Jorge Silva made their first appearance in Leipzig in 1972, with “Planas, testimonio de un etnocidio” (1971) in the retrospective “Film in the People’s Struggle for Freedom: Latin America” as well as in the television competition and in the cinema competition with “Chircales” (1972). Both films were awarded Golden Doves, Rodríguez and Silva became instant stars of the festival. In 1975, “Campesinos” brought them back to Leipzig. This film marks the beginning of their exploration of the centuries-old oppression of indigenous communities in the Cauca region in southwestern Colombia and their equally long resistance against colonial exploitation and dispossession. Years later, the theme culminated in “Nuestra voz de tierra, memoria y futuro”, in which they used some shots from “Campesinos”. Rodríguez and Silva document the process of political organisation in the Coconuco community during the land reform movement of the 1970s, with extensive critical collaboration by their protagonists. At the same time, it was an attempt to leave the naturalism of the documentary format behind and approach the subconscious mind of the indigenous culture, “to depict its magical world in all its complexity and beauty”, as Silva put it in a conversation with Peter B. Schumann in the information leaflet of the 1982 Berlinale Forum. The film re-celebrated its world premiere in its restored digital version at the 2019 Forum.

Florian Wüst