Science on Screen: EMBRACE OF THE SERPENT with Arthur Trese

Watch Trailer Director: Ciro Guerra
Writer(s): Ciro Guerra and Theodor Koch-Grunberg (based on the diary by)
Cast: Nilbio Torres, Jan Bijvoet and Antonio Bolivar

As part of the 43rd Athens International Film + Video Festival, The Athena Cinema is proud to present EMBRACE OF THE SERPENT as part of the Science on Screen℠ series

At once blistering and poetic, the ravages of colonialism cast a dark shadow over the South American landscape in EMBRACE OF THE SERPENT, the third feature by Ciro Guerra. Filmed in stunning black-and-white, SERPENT centers on Karamakate, an Amazonian shaman and the last survivor of his people, and the two scientists 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 Koch-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.

In conjunction with the film there will be a talk with Ohio University Associate Professor of Environmental and Plant Biology, Arthur Trese.

Science on Screen℠ is a project of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation and The Coolidge Corner Theater. The Science on Screen program pairs with a short talk with a scientist or technology expert. The free Science on Screen events are fun and engaging and offer dynamic speakers an unexpected jumping point to teach their field of expertise in a way that is accessible to a diverse audience.