For the Ayoreo Totobiegosode people, the word “eami” means forest and world. Such twinned meaning speaks to the way this indigenous community understands the environment around them. The forest is their world. Or was. For now, the Paraguayan Chaco where the Ayoreo Totobiegosode live is the territory with the highest deforestation rate in the world. Such a statistic may not be explicitly spelled out in Paz Encina’s dreamlike feature “Eami,” but it nevertheless helps structure this fictionalized story of a 5-year-old girl called Eami (Anel Picanerai) who’s mourning the place she now must leave, like many in her family have been forced to do before. As a conduit for the history of her people, Eami conjures up other stories that make this poetic ode to the ongoing fight for the memory of the Ayoreo Totobiegosode.
From its very first image, “Eami” demands you…
