Ciro Guerra's Embrace of the Serpent has been lavished with praise, earning an award at Cannes and nominated for another at the Indie Spirits. Not only that, but it is Colombia's entry for Best Foreign Language Film at the Academy Awards and is looking to make the final cut. Now as the tribal adventure gets ready to play at Sundance in a couple of weeks, a gorgeous new trailer has debuted.
Set in the Amazon during the early part of the 20th century, the film centers on a shaman and his encounters with a pair of scientists over many years. Here's the synopsis:
The ravages of colonialism cast a dark shadow over the South American landscape in "Embrace Of The Serpent," the first film shot in the Amazonian rainforest in over 30 years. Filmed in stunning black-and-white, the film centers on Karamakate (portrayed in various stages by Nilbio Torres and Antonio Bolívar Salvado), an Amazonian shaman and the last survivor of his people, and the two scientists (Evans and Theo, portrayed by Brionne Davis and Jan Bijvoet) who, over the course of 40 years, build a friendship with him. The film was inspired by the real-life journals of two explorers (Theodor Kock-Grünberg and Richard Evans Schultes) who traveled through the Colombian Amazon during the last century in search of the sacred and difficult-to-find psychedelic Yakruna plant.
Stunning, and this just moved up on my list of movies to see in Park City. Embrace of the Serpent opens in NY on February 17th, followed by Los Angeles two days later.
