Storyteller with 15 years of experience in short and feature documentary film making. Experienced
director, cinematographer and editor, sometimes playing just one of these roles, but also as a “one-man
team”.
About
My name is Fred Rahal.
For the last 10 years I've been dedicated to combining my professional work with my personal activism, getting closer to socio-environmental productions.
As a photographer, I can highlight my participation in the films "Evoé" by Tadeu Jungle and Elaine César and "Way Beyond Weight", directed by Estela Renner. As well as several mini-documentaries for ISA (Instituto Socioambiental), Instituto Iepé and for Partnerships for Forests. I also photographed and edited virtual reality (VR) films, such as "Fire in the Forest", about the forest fires in the Xingu Indigenous Park and "Mud River", both directed by Tadeu Jungle. The latter, about the Samarco dam collapse in Mariana, Brazil, won the Best Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) award in Action Film Award at the UN.
As an film editor, I would like to highlight the film "Sob a Pata do Boi", about deforestation and cattle ranching in the Amazon, directed by Marcio Isensee.
And as a director, I have four feature-length documentaries: "Silence is a Prayer" (2019), "BR Acima de
Tudo" (2020), "Forest Partners" (2021) and "Listen: the land was torn" (2023).
Featured Work
View Listen: the land was torn
A partir do universo de três povos indígenas pressionados pela destruição causada pelo garimpo, o filme propõe uma aproximação do pensamento dos Yanomami, Munduruku e Mebêngôkre (Kayapó), na formação de uma aliança histórica em defesa dos territórios. É, portanto, uma narrativa sobre resistência e resiliência, na figura de uma união inédita que firma a manutenção de seus territórios físicos e subjetivos. Para além da destruição causada pelo garimpo, este é um filme sobre a impossibilidade de separação entre a existência indígena e o seu território.
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View Terra Yanomami celebra 30 anos da homologação
Em 25 de maio de 2022, os Yanomami, liderados por Davi Kopenawa, reuniram mais de 500 pessoas na comunidade de Xihopi, no estado do Amazonas, para celebrar os 30 anos da homologação da Terra Indígena Yanomami, fortalecer a luta por seus direitos e pedir respeito e paz para viver. Além de aliados históricos, como Ailton Krenak, Sydney Possuelo e Joenia Wapichana, entre outros, durante os festejos os pajés convidaram os espíritos da floresta para celebrarem, junto com eles, a histórica conquista.
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View BR ACIMA DE TUDO
In the North of the Brazilian State of Para is located the world's largest block of protected forests. An area of Amazon Rainforest with the size of the United Kingdom, that shelters a myriad of stories. Indigenous people, cattle ranchers, small farmers, descendents of black slaves, business owners and politicians reflect in their particular way the effects of the potential expansion of BR-163's road deep into the forest, until the border with Suriname. The project of the highway was born back in the times of the Brazilian military dictatorship, and until today hovers like a shadow over the region. This movie, however, isn't about a road. It is a movie about the chasms that separate those who share the same land.
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View Forest Partners
Forest Partners highlights an often unseen side of forests – the economic ecosystems thriving between public and private organisations and local communities.
Travelling the tropics, the film showcases successful innovations in sustainable production systems worldwide, proving it is possible to obtain social, environmental, and economic benefits by preserving or restoring forest landscapes.
The initiatives featured over 45-minutes are based in South America, Africa, and Asia, in regions where there are still preserved forest landscapes, but where the impacts of deforestation and forest degradation are already widely felt. These solutions combine technology and traditional knowledge to protect tropical forests, with shared benefits – and they need to be scaled.
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