Original subtitles

Downloaded from YTS.MX

Official YIFY movies site: YTS.MX

Pierre-Dominique Gaisseau, filmmaker, journalist and adventurer.

"Sky Above and Mud Beneath"!

Pierre Gaisseau's documentary "Sky Above and Mud Beneath"...

This feature film has just won

one of cinema's highest distinctions:

the 1962 Oscar awarded in Hollywood.

Another journey soon?

Yes, I'm going to make a film about the life of a village.

- The customs and its people. - Exactly.

- Where is it set exactly? - In the San Blas Islands,

off the coast of Panama, on the Caribbean side.

It's about a matrilocal society.

That's why I call the film "God is a Woman".

Their initiation ceremonies involve only women.

GOD IS A WOMAN

47 years have passed.

The film was lost, you understand.

It was here in Ustupu in 1975.

Today,

I'm still waiting, because they filmed my wedding and I never saw it.

Yes!

This friend was named Pierre,

and his wife's name was Kyoko.

Akiko was their baby.

She was so cute, we all called the film "Akiko".

The Frenchman said right here:

"When I finish this film, I'll give it to you."

But this friend fell ill,

and what's more, a bank confiscated the film.

This is what I wanted to share.

My people, I must tell you something.

I remember I was with my father, William.

We arrived at the French fiduciary bank.

Let me tell you what my father said to the director of the bank:

"This documentary must remain for eternity.

"It contains the foundation of the Kuna people's dignity."

My father asked the director

to honor his promise

made to the Kuna people

to give a copy of the film

to Ustupu and the Kunas.

The bank director answered:

"We gave the film

"to the Ministry of Culture, we've already done the necessary."

"But you didn't do the necessary for us!

"You acted for the benefit of a governmental entity.

"The debt is toward us!"

While the chicha was boiling, they came to film the grandmothers

at work in the kitchen.

My mother was filmed,

my grandmothers, too.

And my deceased father-in-law.

A lot of people have died since then.

Demetria was crying

and fainted during the initiation ceremony.

A roasted plantain, Aunt Laida?

That's the man's daughter.

Look at the girl.

Look here, too. Who do you think it is?

I don't know, I won't lie.

She's next to the foreigner.

Look, you were asking me who Akiko is.

Akiko is the girl.

And that's the girl's father.

The papa. The father, you see.

And that's Turpana.

From the neighboring island, right?

Turpana's from Obgobsuggun.

Who are you talking about?

Akiko and Turpana.

You need glasses.

What's up, Turpana, my friend?

Do you remember Akiko's house?

Yes, it was right behind here.

The house was here. There's a new building now.

The foreigner's standing here, filming the initiation ceremony.

I took these photos.

- All this is the same day? - Yes.

What year was it?

1975.

I was the photographer at the time of Akiko.

- This is Pierre. - Yes, Pierre and Kyoko.

They're out of the frame.

This was the house where Akiko stayed.

They lived upstairs.

Yes, I was living below.

You were there too, Turpana?

I kept a lot of photos but they got damaged.

I must admit, I tore a lot of them up,

so no one would see anything compromising.

You know what I mean?

- Did you plug it in? - Not yet.

- It doesn't fit. - It doesn't?

Is it damaged?

Plug it in behind.

- It's on. - It's on?

Ah, it goes this way.

Where's "Play"?

Pierre!

I'm Kyoko. Akiko is my daughter.

- Shall we sing? - Yes.

Let's sing "Mama, Mama, Mama..."

It's finished.

Maybe there's something on the other side.

Let's see.

OK, we'll turn it over.

We ended up learning how to make this thing work.

We're experts now.

I just tried to help out Gaisseau,

on his fabulous new film

on the Kuna, but nothing much came of it.

The market seems to be shrinking instead of growing.

Akiko, this is her school experience?

Yes... with the Kuna.

That's our neighbor.

We had a special relation with our landlord and neighbors,

So we could get any song, anything.

My wife Kyoko spent all her days there

talking with the people and recording.

They came to film.

They told my husband, Demetrio, and he didn't want them to:

"I haven't consulted the village council. If the people agree, I'll agree, too."

The leaders accepted,

so my husband said OK, because the people said yes.

"Pay me something." They said no.

"So I can break even.

"You'll make money by showing the film!"

He said, "I know what Whites are like: they think of business, not me!

"I'm a real indigenous person, so they'll distribute and sell my image."

He told Akiko they were going to make a profit off his back.

I never got a penny for that shoot.

The only thing I want from them is the film.

Because I've never seen it.

I want the film, too, because my mother is in it.

It's said that in Mexico,

the line to see the film went several times around the cinema.

Where do some Kunas get these stories? They sure have imagination!

Everything had been filmed except for the wedding ceremony.

I was just hanging around, and I was told: "You'll have to act."

- No one was getting married then? - No, there was no wedding.

There was the puberty ceremony and everything else.

But no wedding.

So I said to Estella:

"We're going to get married again!"

We became actors within a few seconds.

Yes, a second wedding!

That's right.

This one wasn't real, it was staged.

The others, you could say, were...

They were real.

They were lived.

Pierre filmed everything he saw, down to the last detail.

I remember having several discussions with Pierre.

Discussions in a positive sense.

Why did he say "God is a Woman"?

Why that title?

Because, for him, Kuna society is a matriarchy.

Women rule here.

And I said to him, "But Pierre, look, the Congress is full of men!"

But nothing could change his mind.

Another discussion I had with him concerned a girl reaching puberty.

The rite had begun, and women arrived with gourds.

Then other women came with plastic bottles.

So, Pierre is filming, pointing his camera like this,

at the line of women,

and I'm there with the boom.

All of a sudden, Pierre starts yelling:

"Women with the plastic bottles, get out of the shot!"

Then he says to me in French, "Tell them to get out".

So I tell these women to get out.

And the women answer:

"What's wrong with this filmmaker? He's crazy!"

And then they leave.

Later that night, when we get back to the house,

I ask Pierre why he had done that.

And he says:

"If I show this film in Europe, Europeans are going to mock me.

"They'll say that I wasn't in a real indigenous community,

"that I invented it."

That was his argument.

- Because of the plastic bottles? - Right.

So I say to Pierre:

"But Pierre, society is changing.

"Our society isn't the same as it was before.

"We do modern things now."

You see?

Everything that was Western had no value for Pierre.

Still today, there are people with this "romantic" mentality.

As if we indigenous people weren't allowed to change.

As if time has been frozen since the Spanish Conquest.

The "Nele" is a clairvoyant

In your dreams, you live in another world,

so you don't have to learn things, everything comes to you naturally.

Turpana was born like that.

But he never used it.

He went away, studied...

He's scared of it, he's interested in it,

because he was told he was born a Nele.

MINISTRY OF CULTURE

Hello.

I have a meeting with the Vice Minister at noon.

Can I have your name, please?

Turpana.

Hello.

The Vice Minister's office, please?

Of course, my pleasure.

- Door 313. - 315?

No, 313.

Hello.

Professor, come in.

Hello.

- How are you? - Good.

Long time no see!

Indeed!

I think I need to take one of your classes again

because I need one more subject before I can validate my diploma.

Which class of mine are you missing?

Psycholinguistics.

Psycholinguistics?

I think I have to be there in person.

I don't have time to go to the university, so I have to find a solution.

Can we make an arrangement to do it virtually?

Of course, no problem.

I have some good news for you.

When I started here after the transition, on my first day, the office was empty

except for some boxes left behind containing reels of film.

I remember that...

Kathy, the Director of Cultural Heritage,

came and we discussed what we could do with them.

It's a film, so I told her that we couldn't just leave it here.

I immediately began to make

the necessary calls to the cultural heritage person

in charge of cinema at the ministry.

And they told me that a certain Turpana had collaborated on the film.

I was surprised!

I told them: "That's my university professor!"

So from what I understand,

the film was always here and no one did anything about it.

If only he had known, he'd have contacted me right away

and I'd have told him right away the story of the film.

It wouldn't have gone round and round to the wrong people.

Want to see the reels?

You didn't recover anything else?

Just this.

We'll open it quickly, because of the smell.

Yes, OK.

Be careful, it could be toxic, and all four of us might be found dead!

It's been eaten by rust.

Oh no, it's a disaster, how sad!

- Here. - Yes...

You can see it's deteriorating.

Yes, practically...

They let everything decompose, through negligence.

They didn't know how to take care of it.

Today you have arrived in the great house,

the house of celestial guardians,

the house of silence.

Each of us has come by himself, one by one.

We are still in good enough health to welcome you.

My brothers, we invoke the name of the Father.

No one else will protect us.

Only the Great Mother will defend us.

My brothers, what a marvelous thing to live

on these lands that belong to us

where we can sleep without fear until the morning.

Our fathers fought the Revolution for us 97 years ago.

Now it's up to us to take care of our land.

That's why, my young intellectual brothers,

capable of entering the sanctuaries of knowledge,

I have called you,

so you can provide the parents with strength.

Protecting spirits, I invoke you

before the silence of the night covers the earth entirely.

My children, always be vigilant.

If only we could resuscitate this land for the Father every day,

Remember the great sages, recount their stories.

Today, what are we going to do for Ustupu?

Return to the Ustupu of our parents' pain, of our mothers' suffering?

Will we let our territory suffer like in those days?

I see that our roots

have dried up.

Now I see empty chairs, there's no one.

We need to talk, our history is our spirit, it's what happens to us.

Must we rise up again?

I started thinking again about the story of the film.

In the Whites' business, we waste our time.

We are the Kuna people. Let's think of our future.

Two years later

Dear Turpana,

I'm in one of the many cafés you told me about.

I didn't think I'd find it this easily.

I'm talking to my friend, a friend who lived in Paris.

He died.

We thought that one day we'd meet up in this café.

I want to celebrate the poet's memory.

Excuse me, my Spanish is very limited.

And my French is practically non-existent.

But we're surprisingly linked through Turpana's friendship.

He really loved Paris.

He studied cinema in Paris.

He fell in love in Paris.

So did I.

I was also a student in Paris.

Two Kunas in Paris.

Turpana, I always have your poems on me.

"With the sepulchral sadness of a verse by Verlaine

"Beneath the feverish firmament ablaze

"The coconut trees rave complaints of lyrics absurd

"Useless desires to sway your body

"Which realize so amply the light of my passions

"On these Kuna atolls of artificial castles

"Where, without you, half my hammock lies in vain."

Thank you, Arysteides Turpana, for everything you've given us...

In words, in actions and in struggles.

For this, to your memory,

I raise my glass, dear poet.

I have something to tell you, Turpana.

Our little Akiko has left this world.

But she left us a treasure.

Imagine, Pierre had hidden the original copy

in a cellar in Paris.

The French National Center for Cinema has begun restoring it.

Today, I'll finally be able to see it.

This film, so inhabited by you, my dear brother.

I've come to tell you something.

All the work that was done when you were filmed,

After everything you've endured while waiting all these years,

- the film is coming home. Do you hear? - Yes, I hear.

I can't wait to see the whole thing.

Flashes popping all around, they recorded me, filmed me...

Lost for ages and now coming home!

My daughter's initiation lasted 3 days.

I tell her, "It was your celebration.

"We did it for you aged 4, in the Kuna way.

"Your dad spent big money for your celebration.

"So many deer were hunted!

"So many peccaries!

"Your late grandpa would have hunted a tapir!"

I want to show the film to my grandchildren.

- What do you think of that? - You're right.

You want to show it.

They filmed your wedding with Estella, so you want to show it, too.

- You want to tell your children about it. - That's right.

I'll cry. You'll see your wife and your wedding again.

- It will be hard for you. - You're right, a great pain.

You'll cry for your father: "That's what my father looked like!"

You were a baby.

You mustn't miss this, you have to come.

Same for your sister, Demetriana. You must both come to Ustupu.

You've always wanted to see your father young and dancing for you.

He offered you that initiation ceremony. I think you'll cry.

You hear me?

He paid for the ceremony when you were a baby. You hear?

Demetria, Wagadinubiguidili,

you have to put some money aside.

You hear?

Oh no, how horrible, you're half shaved!

These are my two aunts, and this is me at 4 years old.

- Who's this? - Our grandmother. She's so beautiful!

This is me at the initiation ceremony, wearing a mola.

Not all girls have a celebration.

Only those from families that can afford it.

Lots of people don't have the means

for a three-day celebration.

But as Papa worked far from the island, in different provinces,

he could afford it.

And when Monsieur Akiko arrived with his family in Ustupu,

he filmed me for his film.

They participated in all the customs and traditions in Ustupu.

When she told me that Mama had called to share the good news, I was shocked!

And it's not even me who was filmed, but I couldn't believe it.

I said, "What? After all these years?"

Both of us were like, "Wow, we're going to see all that!"

You can't miss this! We'll save some money and go.

Here, we pay no homage to assassin dogs

Like a two-way Balboa street I show up bold and raw

Unmasking step by step

Your history and all its concepts

From this concrete jungle

Always loyal to my ancestors

Roaring like a jaguar and spitting on the pavement

Unraveling your texts, armed with verses and prose

The way Master Turpana used to do it

With reasoning that dismantles every insidious and poisonous letter.

The idea is to make it smooth, the camera will follow you...

America, name given by the invader to this continent

Which we know as Abiayala whose sacred etymology means:

"Fertile land emptied of its blood".

Unfortunately, the official history lies to us.

The Panamanian school is not one where you're taught to reflect,

but rather to assimilate what the teacher tells you.

Making films was quite elitist.

It was reserved for a certain social class.

No one in Panama dreamed of making films, especially not indigenous peoples.

It was impossible for a Kuna to pick up a camera and film.

Now we can say that even with the few means we have,

we can tell our stories.

That's why, when I give a visual or cinema workshop,

I always start with these questions:

How do others see us? How do we see ourselves?

How would we like to be seen by others?

Those are key questions for me.

Hello. I'm looking for white fabric.

It's to project a film on.

What do you suggest?

What's this material called?

Satin.

- How much is this one? - 3.99.

Let's see how big it is. Pull it this way.

The wind is really strong, so we need a fabric that's resistant.

Will that hold up?

OK, but in black.

Thank you.

Goodbye, thanks!

Thank you!

Hey, what's up?

I was thinking...

If we put it here, in the center, and not over there,

people can set up their chairs right here.

In the middle, here.

The idea is to put the screen there.

On this side.

- And the audience on this side? - Yeah, that's it.

And since we're in the central axis,

when the film is projected,

people will be able to see it

from far away.

And it will make them want to come closer.

Hey, go fetch some stones.

Stones!

We're going to need some white thread for here.

On the sides, we'll use two black threads.

And here, just one white thread.

I'm like Rambo with his bazooka!

I'll need a day for the lining, and the next day, I'll start the black.

I'll need 2 days, 3 days max, to make sure it's perfect.

It's 4.42 meters wide.

The height is 2.83 meters.

So an image of around 4 by 2.

We finished. We just need the black thread.

We'll use wood to make a structure for the screen.

A big pole here...

That will leave spaces.

Spaces here, once we've installed everything.

It could become loose and get damaged.

The fabric is really big, so it'll move all over the place.

We need wooden planks here and there to keep it steady.

So we'll do this.

- With wooden planks. - Several of them.

Here I am on my way home after so many years, 22 years!

I'm back from Paris.

That's where I picked up the film.

- How emotional! - Yes, my God!

Well... here we go then!

I'm thinking of starting. a weekly podcast...

You disappear for a while and then show up again?

I'm telling you, it's straight on.

What's new, my friend?

- Where is it? - Straight on.

Oh my god, she forgot where the house is!

Look at the girls!

How are you?

I feel like Miss Universe.

My God, we've forgotten everything!

- We've forgotten where the house is. - That's it.

I'd forgotten.

We missed you, Mama!

I love you so much.

My neck is bothering me a little.

I take the medicine that you sent me.

This is Flower, do you remember?

And here's Wagadinubiguidili, the one we did the haircutting ceremony for.

This is Aunt Modesta.

Her sister, her sister.

How are you?

My God!

I was telling them that when I was younger,

I would watch their mother dance.

I'd go just to see you.

I danced a lot.

My mother told me that I was still a kid for her.

You practiced in the afternoon, every day.

You see how he remembers!

He said that he was watching the young lady.

He was secretly in love with me.

He could have been successful,

but his friend wasn't as shy and got there first!

I bought an iron cane so I can walk.

Everywhere else, I feel good.

If it weren't for that, I'd still dance.

- You'd still dance? - I would.

And you'd watch me again!

You'd divorce your wife for me!

Show them how you used to hold the bamboo flute.

This is hard!

The fucker!

- You're the boss now. - I sure am.

I'm head of the community, it's no joke!

How do you get along with the big chief?

It's serious, we've a really big job.

Before, our ancestors planted everything:

sweet potatoes,

taro,

yucca...

You see? We lived off our land.

Now people don't even know what a taro or sweet potato is!

We don't plant anymore.

That's why some kids have never eaten them.

- There's none left. - Don't get me started!

We're running out of stocks.

We're totally out of maize.

That's why we're weak: we're out of maize.

You're right. So now,

you have to spend money to buy canned food.

That's exactly right.

That's how it is.

We have to make do.

Some small islands have already disappeared.

When the tide is low, they appear again.

A little piece of land.

And when the tide rises, they vanish again.

They're being engulfed.

Here's the path.

OK, I see it.

Your farm runs along here.

Where the streams are.

Look at your coconuts.

You want the camera?

Gimme a second.

Give me a second.

Hand it to me.

Be careful with it.

I remember Grandpa.

Now I can see his farm through the lens of the camera.

I remember that he once said to me:

"If you fail in the world in any way,

"and you're feeling down or tired,

"remember you have land here."

The land has a lot to do with...

memory.

For example, if someone tells you

"We're going to dig mines and exploit your land,"

who the hell would let them?

A place where Grandpa and Grandma sweated blood...

Who would want to sell that land?

The Kuna philosophy is:

You have to work the land and love it.

They wanted to cut us off from that.

They lied to us, saying...

that Western education is what's best.

But when you grow up, you realize that it isn't.

You realize that you can be both a filmmaker and a farmer.

Or a fisherman

and a filmmaker.

Careful not to rip it.

Come see Akiko's film!

Tonight in the park, at seven!

The Caribbean Sea and the Darién,

the shores where Columbus first landed on the continent of the Americas,

the land which he named Tierra Firma, the mainland,

which is now Panama.

There are 365 islands along this coast,

and 30,000 Indians: the Kuna,

the last free Indians.

They fought for 400 years to keep this independence,

making alliances with privateers and buccaneers,

and eventually sailing out with them to discover the world.

But the Kuna have never forsaken their own traditions.

If they believe in God,

they also believe in Mu, the Earth Mother,

Here, because of Mu,

only women have initiation rituals.

They are symbols of the continuity of life, of life itself.

Even little girls are treated with respect.

And then in a perfect mirror of the processes of nature,

like the flower which catches the pollen from the wind,

she will have the man of her dreams abducted by members of her family.

He is brought to her.

This ritual abduction is repeated three days in a row.

This young man has two chances, if he wishes, to escape,

but he must flee the community.

After the third day, he belongs to her.

This is a Kuna love song.

It says: "I love you." That's all.

Sharing the work, sharing the food,

sharing the sacred drink

is, to the Kuna, a religious experience.

To the Kuna, "Inna" is a drug, and if successful,

it should take them back into the protection of Mu's womb.

All activities in the Inna ritual must be performed while dancing.

The women are already in the mood.

It's a very costly proposition for the family responsible.

Led by Demetrio,

family friends are now transferring the necessary objects...

That's Papa!

That's Papa walking!

My eldest sister, Mama with the big earrings!

Us with the Chief!

Your father, Demetrio Prestan.

Your father's coming.

He's dancing, carrying you into the surba.

We're going to cut your hair, Demetria.

Grandfather Felipe and all the aunts accompany you into the surba.

This is the women's part of the ritual.

The only males accepted here are the little girl's relatives.

- That's Papa? - Yes!

They're preparing the tobacco.

That's me, Laida, singing!

It was incredible!

Thank you so much.

Sincerely.

To see Papa again, who has passed on...

How can you not cry?

So many years!

To think I'm 51 years old!

- I think the place was full. - All the way to the back.

How many people came?

About fifty thousand.

Between fifty and a hundred thousand!

Half the community, I think.

We can be sure that those who have passed on were there with us.

People even realized that Olo had aged.

- No one noticed until yesterday! - Even things like that were revealed!

It's been almost 50 years.

50 years seems like a lot and not much.

Because the film itself coincided

with the 50th anniversary of the Revolution.

It was 50 years after the Revolution, and we'll soon celebrate its centenary.

It's not a coincidence, it's a wake-up call,

our grandparents telling us:

"You need to wake up! Get a hold of yourselves!"

This youth needs to be awakened for our Kuna nation

to get back on the track that we have left

and get out of its lethargy.

We need to wake up and renew ourselves.

The film wasn't made for the Kunas.

It was made so that foreigners can see it.

For example, the translations are direct translations

of what was going on inside the director's mind.

It's an omnipresent sound, all the time,

and after a while, it becomes aggressive.

From time to time, you hear songs, people's voices...

but it's as if what people are saying isn't important.

At one point, people stopped paying attention

to the director's narration.

The image simply ended up taking over.

He pursued a certain anthropological vision

of indigenous peoples,

seeing them as everything exotic

or everything that's faraway:

"We watch from afar how they maintain their culture."

The kind of language common in the 70s, which can still be heard today.

Indigenous cultures are only good in terms of tourism, right?

For example, not long ago...

people were asking

if they could receive grants to open community museums.

And the minister was like:

"Yes, we must do it, it will help tourism."

- Fuck if I care about tourism! - It's all they know.

What the hell do I care about tourism?

The children need it.

The communities need it.

They need to know

what their true worth is.

What our communities have is precious.

We saw that yesterday:

the value this film has for the community.

We feel valued as Kunas,

because we see our reflection on the screen.

I'd say that right now,

we need to think about what the next step is for us.

You Orgun, you Duiren, who are in that field, what do we do?

It's like a challenge launched by someone who came, introduced himself,

with a filming machine

and his supposedly exotic point of view,

as was often the case at that time.

But this same product can also help the community

to reclaim it and give it their own interpretation.

This time with a political conscience, to turn it to our advantage.

It's in here, in that little black box?

There's black and white film.

It looks like a gun that gangsters use.

I'd like to see even older cameras, from classical cinema.

John Ford's cameras.

- Where did you get it? - France.

- They used this for the film? - That's the one.

The very same.

You don't have a compressed air blower?

- No. - Shame.

The light is on.

The balls are lit up!

I'm in the clouds.

That little sound, I love it.

I won't be able to sleep anymore.

- It's like you're in another world. - Another world, yes.

- Mind standing over there? - Come!

We're going to make you handsome. Put on your necklace.

The traditional glass is missing. Can you find it?

Look at me, Auntie.

Do you want to try?

Are you going to hold it?

Let me help you.

Press that button, OK?

Point it where you like.

Look here, Miss!

- Look, they're going already. - Oh, shit!

They have to wait for me, tell them to wait for me.

- I'm supposed to lead them. - Right.

I told them to wait for me.

They just left.

- There's Celestino! - Call him!

Celestino!

I'll catch up with them, I should be there.

You still have time.

They must be on the main path.

Take this.

Carry this.