Nov 08 2010
New Documentary Waste Land Profiles Garbage Pickers in Brazil
The new documentary film Waste Land follows the artist Vik Muniz from his adopted home in New York to his native country of Brazil and the world’s largest landfill, the Jardim Gramacho. At the Jardim, Vik recruits garbage pickers to be photographed. Garbage from the landfill becomes the recycled material that serves as the medium to re-create photos of his subjects on a large scale, which are then sold to benefit the pickers. The scavengers are all ages, from young adults to senior citizens. They serve as the bottom-rung labor of a globalized recycling system, picking an estimated 200 tons of recyclable material from the mountain of trash each day. What they pick is sold to recycling wholesalers who then ship it around the world to be reused as any number of plastic, glass, paper, and metal products. Muniz set out to raise awareness about the general situation of Brazil’s scavengers, but the individuals who pose for his pictures become central characters in the film. We are introduced to Tiao, who began working at the landfill as a child and is now the President of the Association of the Pickers of Jardim Gramacho, a labor and community organization that fights for better working and living conditions. Another picker is Suelem, an 18-year-old who works to support her two young children and mother. Waste Land is not an overwhelming tale of poverty and charity. It is a film about art and community and the transformative experience that develops from a sincere group effort to expose an invisible class of people.
GUEST: Lucy Walker, Director Waste Land, previous films include Countdown to Zero, and Blindsight
Waste land is showing at the Nuart from Friday November 5th to Thursday November 11th. It then goes to the Laemmle on November 13th (Monica 4-Plex, Playhouse 7 in Pasadena, Towncenter 5 in Encino, and Claremont 5 in Claremont).
Visit the film’s website at www.wastelandmovie.com.
2 Responses to “New Documentary Waste Land Profiles Garbage Pickers in Brazil”
Very interesting. I’m not in dire financial straits at this time, but I pick up food scraps that I see on the ground, put them into my mobile compost bin, and use it as mulch for my trees or just to give something to the earth.
I saw this film at the Austin Film Festival in Austin, Texas it was absolutely amazing. Muniz took the landfill and turned it into a life changing story. The pickers in the film are such beautiful people inside and out. I highly recommend that everyone takes the time to see this film. It will change your outlook on the environment and the struggles people are facing around the world.