Eating Up Easter to be shown on November 9 at 11:30 am.

About the Festival:

Arica Nativa is a festival of beautiful films with the ability to make new generations fall in love with the conservation of the natural and cultural treasures of the planet.

Arica Nativa is one of the main projects of the Altiplano Foundation, a non-profit organization that assists Andean and rural communities in need of conserving their natural and cultural heritage, in order to achieve a more joyful and sustainable world and community.

About Eating Up Easter: 

A native Rapanui filmmaker narrates to his son the modern dilemma of their people, descendants of the ancient statue builders, who are working to tackle the consequences of their rapidly developing home. In doing so their stories reveal the complexities and the contradictions we all face about our planet’s future.

The iconic carved statues of ‘Easter Island’ have fascinated visitors for hundreds of years, but the culture that crafted them – the Rapanui people – are often left to the imagination of outsiders. Deforested and barren, the island of Rapa Nui has limited primary industries, but has benefited economically from the rise of tourism, but must now contend with unsustainable waste and the disappearance of local ways of life.

Documentary filmmaker Sergio M. Rapu passes on this story to his newborn son, while his father – a local entrepreneur – tries to set up the island’s first mall to bring the advancements of the Western world closer to the community. Meanwhile, a local ecologist struggles to contend with the island’s escalating waste problem, while two musicians fight to make their community music school a reality. Interlacing these stories with the history of the island and its people, EATING UP EASTER captures the complexities of balancing local authenticity with the commercial demands of modern globalization, and demonstrates that sustainability is not only ecological, but also cultural.