This Stolen Country of Mine (w/ Fernando Villavicencio)
Conservation
•
1h 32m
Directed by Marc Wiese • Documentary • With Paúl Jarrín Mosquera, Fernando Villavicencio • 2022 • 93 minutes
Chinese mining in Ecuador’s mountains sets the stage for an epic battle between eco-guerrillas and a corrupt government in an intensely dramatic documentary.
This Stolen Country of Mine follows Paúl Jarrín Mosquera, who leads the indigenous resistance against the exploitation of their land. Meanwhile, China uses the Ecuadorian government to turn the country into one of its new colonies, having made the country dependent on credit through a series of corrupt and greedy treaties. When journalist Fernando Villavicencio (who was assassinated while running for president in 2023) exposes these plots and gets access to the contracts between China and Ecuador, the government wants him silenced too. Both men are fighting for freedom in this battle against a superpower.
Directed by award-winning filmmaker Marc Wiese, the film exposes China’s massive hunger for natural resources and how during the last decade it has been aggressively operating to obtain access to these resources in Ecuador. The country is now stuck with the most Chinese debts in Latin America.
“Elegantly made and with an evocative soundtrack by Alva Noto, This Stolen Country of Mine is a strikingly dramatic documentary about the consequences of globalisation and when a population rises up and protests.” —Mark Adams, Cineuropa
Up Next in Conservation
-
Symbiotic Earth
Directed by John Feldman • Documentary • 2018 • 147 minutes
SYMBIOTIC EARTH explores the life and ideas of Lynn Margulis, a brilliant and radical scientist, whose unconventional theories challenged the male-dominated scientific community and are today fundamentally changing how we look at our se...
-
A Sea Turtle Story
Directed by Kathy Shultz • Animation • 2012 • 10 minutes
Under the cover of night, a sea turtle secretly digs a hole on a tropical beach and lays her eggs in the sand before returning to the ocean. With each tide, the hatchlings grow until they are strong enough to emerge, climb to the surface a...
-
The Time of Forests
Directed by François-Xavier Drouet • Documentary • 2018 • 103 minutes
As the symbol of authentic, preserved wild nature, forests are undergoing an unprecedented phase of industrialization. Heavy mechanization, monoculture, fertilizers and pesticides, loss of traditional know-how, forest manageme...