“Land of Fire – Tales from the World´s End”

Alpine and foreign cultures (), Uwe Müller, Renate Marel 53 min

There are few places on Earth where the association between the eternal cycles of nature and the ancient myths of the indigenous peoples is so manifest as in Tierra del Fuego, one of the southernmost inhabited regions in the world. When the first Spanish conquerors reached the storm beaten southern extremity of South America, they saw hundreds of campfires of the Native Americans burning on the coast. They gave the land around Cape Horn the name Tierra del Fuego – Land of Fire. To this day, the rugged region made up of pampas, mountains, lakes and glaciers is at the mercy of the elements. In summer, a midnight sun burns in the sky, in winter no light comes over the horizon for a whole month. Only hardy forms of land life could survive at the extreme tip of South America and a wild mixture of Atlantic and Pacific forms of marine life. Uwe Müller, accompanies a mestizo Native American through his world. His simple life as a fisherman stands in sharp contrast to modern-day Argentina. For the Native American, nature is still a living entity in which every living creature has its place, its own secret history. But the balance of the once well-adapted animal world has been upset by the introduction of new species. What remains are the annual storms against an imposing mountain backdrop and the solstice festival of the last indigenous people.