Reflecting the question of the other in Brazil: yndio do brasil (s. Back, 1995) and the history of the kátpy monster (kisêdjê indians, 2009)

Abstract

This article proposes a comparative analysis of the opening sequence of Yndio do brasil (Sílvio Back, 1995) - documentary that puts in perspective the representations of the Indian in Brazil - in relation to the short film The story of the monster Kátpy (Kamikia PT Kisedje, Whinti Suyá , 2009) produced in the workshops of the Video in the Villages project by the Kisêdjê Indians and which somehow seems to me to dialogue with the ambitious feature film by Silvio Back. In both films, an anthropological reading of the collective narrative - produced by the set of films clustered in the case of Yndio do Brasil and by the Indians themselves in the case of The story of the monster Kátpy - shows us the importance of the question of the Other in the topographic space and in the space Brazilian mental health. Objects and subjects of discourse, the Indians of Brazil, as well as their audiovisual and cinematographic representations, problematize questions placed on the agenda in the Brazilian collective imagination: what does it mean to be an Indian in Brazil? Such questions lead us to ask ourselves what the audiovisual space and its possibilities represent for indigenous filmmakers and their communities.