The shame of colonialism permeates this documentary. The film opens up with archive footage of Germany, a country that once prided itself on the “Aryan race”, an ideology that mandated the inferiority of other sects of humanity. The narrator informs the viewers of Carl Von Linnaeus wrote a text categorising humans into four boxes. Noting humans as white European, red American, black African and yellow Asian, this book influenced centuries of public thinking. The rest of the work surveys the hierarchy society places on races, narrated in Brazilian Portuguese, with a lot of focus on Amazonians.
Humorously, the movie opens with the revelation that one famous classical aria – the iconic Also Sprach Zarathustra – was not written for 2001: A Space Odyssey (Stanley Kubrick, 1968). Rather, it stemmed from a work composed by Richard Strauss, no doubt influenced by racial purity. Soberingly, No More History Without Us films modern Germany, before the voiceover explains that people set off from Europe for the Amazon two centuries earlier. The imagery is clear: the architecture that built the continent stemmed from the blood of colonial endeavours.
It’s at this point that the work describes Carl Friedrich Philipp von Martius, a German explorer “read and read exhaustively” across Brazil. Seen by some as a poet, Martius nevertheless notarised what he felt could be extracted from the rainforest and returned to Europe. This was the 19th century, but started a trend that can be felt to this very day. Clips of lorries hauling whole trees away from its natural habitat reveal the insidiousness of the culling operation.
Much of the documentary is shot in Belém, a city where there is “no autumn or spring” because of how close it is to the equator line. It is, the narrator says, where Martius arrived to map out the country, etchings used by colonial superpowers. Experimentally, the directors use black and white clips in order to accompany the excerpts of the German’s time in Brazil. Just as they are about to read, the protagonist realises that this perpetuates established stereotypes about Amazonians, and declines the words out of respect for their ancestors.
In no uncertain terms, the movie discusses the “whitening” of Brazilian people; floods of European settlers coming in to “salvage” the country. The filmmakers point out that “rowing” and “wandering” through time, in other words doing chores at an unmeasured pace, is an alien concept to many in Europe “in the frantic pursuit of money, power and control”. Clips show villagers across Brazil enjoying quality time with their families, embracing the pursuits of community and sport.
Forty-nine minutes into the work, the director elects to investigate a museum in Germany in the hope of seeing their “South American collection”. Strangely, they are told it is not open to the public. Whether or not this is due to the shame of history is a moot point; if there are objects, they should be seen by the public. A number of documentarians challenge England, France and Spain on their colonial charges, but this one looks at the lesser-known German incursions into the New World.
When the filmmakers finally read from an extract of Martius’ writings, the words betray a white man tutting at the primacy of the “savages.” Their nutrition is poor, their manners and way of life lazy. These terms are deeply inhuman, but serve as a reminder that they were acceptable not long ago. History must be kept alive and challenged if humans are to evolve; No More History Without Us accomplishes both tasks.
Pointedly, No More History Without Us uses a recording of an executive stating that he doesn’t see it as a “festival film”. Indeed eye-opening activist movies often struggle to reach the circuit, which tends to favour more subtle political statements.
No More History Without Us shows in London on October 27th at the Rich Mix (in London), as part of Voices From The Amazon, Our Stories, Our Solutions. Get your discounted tickets now by clicking here.
