OS FILMES DE CLÁUDIO PACIORNIK

In the late 70s, the films Parto de Cócoras" [Birth in the Squatting Position] (1979), "Índios do Sul do Brasil" [Indians from Southern Brazil] (1979) and "Prevenção do Câncer Ginecológico" [Preventing Gynecological Cancer] (1977) were made by physician and filmmaker Cláudio Paciornik. They are part of project focused on research and preservation of Indian practices concerning birth.

Exhibited in several international movie festivals and in medicine conferences, the films strongly focus on cultural resistance and they document the early studies which led traditional medicine to acknowledge the native Indian birth traditions as more adequate - both to the mother and the baby - than the medical procedures performed until then. Such studies are crucial for the discussion and development of the humanized birth concept, whose precursor in Brazil and worldwide was Dr. Cláudio Paciornik, physician from Curitiba.

One of the differences in conveying such ideas was presenting them in film form.

The film "Childbirth in the Squatting Position", for its quality, influenced the whole scientific community concerned with childbirth and its implications in the humane training of physician, psychologists, anthropologists and other important people involved.

It won awards in film festivals and it is shown to this day in inaugural classes on childbirth around the world, having been considered a classic, a reference, more than 35 years after it was produced, even after the era of digital imaging which made things easier and more common.

In the early 2000s, all the material concerning those documentary films was given to Cinemateca de Curitiba (Curitiba’s Film Library): film negatives and positive images, as well as photographs, which were given to Casa da Memória – Audiovisual Documentation Sector.

Not only the aspect of preserving the culture of native Indians of Paraná calls for urgent restoration of those images, albeit this would be reason enough, but what makes the material so remarkable is that it records the beginning of a relevant research to increase the well-being of a population worldwide, that was only made possible when the traditions of a native people, whose culture was disowned, were acknowledged by the hegemonic eastern medicine.

The film "A Prevenção de Câncer Ginecológico nas 3 Fronteiras" [Gynecological Cancer Prevention at the 3 Frontiers], entered international medical film festivals, and "Índios do Sul do Brasil" [Indians from Southern Brazil], in addition to its scientific aspect, documents work done in Paraná and Santa Catarina, at several communities and Indian reserves from Southern Brazil in the 70s.

Each and every gynecological cancer prevention campaign carried out by Dr. Moysés Paciornik’ s team, and the work done by Dr. Cláudio Paciornik with Indian communities are preserved in images to be seen and consulted.

In terms of memory, they are of inestimable value.  The photo collection is unique.

The negatives and copies were assigned (in 1996) to the Guido Viaro Movie Library of the Cultural Foundation of Curitiba to be kept and protected.  As of that time,  the material has been profoundly damaged and the negatives have been considered to be lost.  

With funding from the Rouanet Law, the “Project for Restoration of Cláudio Paciornik’ s Films” was approved in 2016.