"Salt of the Earth", the new, brilliant French-Brazilian documentary by Wim Wenders and Juliano Ribeiro Salgado, focuses on the life of the great photographer, Sebastião Salgado. It begins with nightmarish images taken by Salgado of 50,000 men working in Brazil's massive Serra Pelada mine.
We are soon introduced to the incredible Sebastião Salgado, who began his career as an economist and left his native Brazil along with his wife, Leila, as a result of political unrest in 1969. The couple moved to France where Juliano (co-director of the film) was born. The family experienced great anguish when a second son was born with Down's Syndrome. After taking family snapshots, Salgado fell in love with photography and gave up his safe career as an economist. He then spent years traveling to all corners of the world, often away from his family.
Salgado's first project was "Otras Americas," shot from 1977 to 1984, which brought him to various South American countries including Mexico. He fell in love with the people there and was struck by their distinctive habits (in one town everyone played a musical instrument; in another, all were long-distance runners).
Salgado's photographs gradually took on a nightmarish quality when he went to Ethiopia to cover the famine there. Words cannot describe the tragic beauty of Salgado's photos, many of which focused on the dead and dying in that part of the world. Salgado was almost killed when two helicopters appeared out of nowhere and began firing machine guns on him and the famine victims he was with.
Just as terrible involved Salgado's journey to Rwanda and the Congo in the 1990s. He chronicles the genocide in Rwanda where thousands of Tutsis were killed by Hutu militia men. After the Tutsis regained control in Rwanda, thousands of Hutu refugees fled to the Congo. Salgado heard about 250,000 of these poor souls who fled into the forest, the only place they could go to without being killed. When Salgado arrived in the Congo, only 40,000 had survived the trek in the woods and after Salgado left, the fate of the remaining survivors is unknown to this day.
Salgado communicated his shock when he encountered genocide in the former Yugoslavia. His photos chronicle the terrible hardships middle-class people endured of different national and ethnic persuasions.
Salgado confessed that his soul was "sick" after experiencing so many horrors and turned to photographing the natural world in his last decade as a professional photographer. His project was called "Genesis" and he traveled to such places as the far reaches of Siberia, to get some amazing shots of walruses and a polar bear intent on protecting his own turf.
Salgado returns full circle to his family home, a ranch in remote Aimorés in Brazil. There, he and his wife decided to plant new trees after drought had killed the trees he knew as a child. Now there are two million trees at the Instituto Terra they established on the family land. What's more, Salgado and his wife donated the land to Brazil, where it's now a national park.
Salgado's son, Juliano, is also responsible for fascinating video footage chronicling trips to visit the Yali people of Papua New Guinea and the Zo'e of Brazil's Amazonia.
Ultimately it's the amazing photographs along with Salgado's commentary that will draw you in. The man is simply incredible, braving death to bring back photographs that will simply amaze you. Salgado captures the human condition in his photos, replete with tragedy and awe-inspiring beauty. See this documentary about an incredible man and incredible artist!
We are soon introduced to the incredible Sebastião Salgado, who began his career as an economist and left his native Brazil along with his wife, Leila, as a result of political unrest in 1969. The couple moved to France where Juliano (co-director of the film) was born. The family experienced great anguish when a second son was born with Down's Syndrome. After taking family snapshots, Salgado fell in love with photography and gave up his safe career as an economist. He then spent years traveling to all corners of the world, often away from his family.
Salgado's first project was "Otras Americas," shot from 1977 to 1984, which brought him to various South American countries including Mexico. He fell in love with the people there and was struck by their distinctive habits (in one town everyone played a musical instrument; in another, all were long-distance runners).
Salgado's photographs gradually took on a nightmarish quality when he went to Ethiopia to cover the famine there. Words cannot describe the tragic beauty of Salgado's photos, many of which focused on the dead and dying in that part of the world. Salgado was almost killed when two helicopters appeared out of nowhere and began firing machine guns on him and the famine victims he was with.
Just as terrible involved Salgado's journey to Rwanda and the Congo in the 1990s. He chronicles the genocide in Rwanda where thousands of Tutsis were killed by Hutu militia men. After the Tutsis regained control in Rwanda, thousands of Hutu refugees fled to the Congo. Salgado heard about 250,000 of these poor souls who fled into the forest, the only place they could go to without being killed. When Salgado arrived in the Congo, only 40,000 had survived the trek in the woods and after Salgado left, the fate of the remaining survivors is unknown to this day.
Salgado communicated his shock when he encountered genocide in the former Yugoslavia. His photos chronicle the terrible hardships middle-class people endured of different national and ethnic persuasions.
Salgado confessed that his soul was "sick" after experiencing so many horrors and turned to photographing the natural world in his last decade as a professional photographer. His project was called "Genesis" and he traveled to such places as the far reaches of Siberia, to get some amazing shots of walruses and a polar bear intent on protecting his own turf.
Salgado returns full circle to his family home, a ranch in remote Aimorés in Brazil. There, he and his wife decided to plant new trees after drought had killed the trees he knew as a child. Now there are two million trees at the Instituto Terra they established on the family land. What's more, Salgado and his wife donated the land to Brazil, where it's now a national park.
Salgado's son, Juliano, is also responsible for fascinating video footage chronicling trips to visit the Yali people of Papua New Guinea and the Zo'e of Brazil's Amazonia.
Ultimately it's the amazing photographs along with Salgado's commentary that will draw you in. The man is simply incredible, braving death to bring back photographs that will simply amaze you. Salgado captures the human condition in his photos, replete with tragedy and awe-inspiring beauty. See this documentary about an incredible man and incredible artist!