First Contact (1983 film)
"First Contact" is the first documentary in what later became known as "The Highland Trilogy". The other two films are "Joe Leahy's Neighbours" (1989) and "Black Harvest" (1992). These three films, between them, have won some thirty major awards, included each film winning both the Grand Prix at the Festival Cinéma du Réel in Paris and AFI Award for Best Documentary.
Cinema of Ecuador
Cinematic production in Ecuador began in the 1920s, with the production of the first Ecuadorian dramatic feature film, "El Tesoro de Atahualpa", directed by the Ecuadorian Augusto San Miguel in 1924. Moreover, in the same decade, the Italian Carlos Crespi directed the major documentary "Los Invisibles Shuaras del Alto Amazonas". Between 1930 and 1931, the advent of talkies stopped the development of Ecuadorian film, which tried to cope with the new films using "live sound" ("sonorización en vivo"), that is, the interpretation of texts and songs simultaneously with the projection, though without success. Because of this, for around two decades Ecuadorian cinema revolved around documentaries, news programs, and promotional tourist films, with the exception of dramatic feature films in 1950. However, Ecuadorian cinema was promoted by intellectuals in the 1960s, including Ulises Estrella, director of the Cinemateca Nacional. During this period, Mexican-Ecuadorian co-productions proliferated. During the next decade, the documentary genre was strengthened, and in 1977 the Asociación de Autores Cinematográficos del Ecuador was legalized.