Grade Level: SrH-Adult
Producer: BBC
Closed Captioned: No |
Running Time: 50 mins
Country of Origin: Great Britain
Study Guide: No |
Copyright Date: 2005
Available in French: No
|
Bruce Parry faces one of his toughest tests yet as he is inducted into Bwiti, a rainforest religion practised by the Babongo people of Gabon. He's right to be worried – on occasion the ritual, which involves consuming an overdose of a powerful hallucinogenic, Iboga, has proved fatal. Tribe follows Bruce's build-up to the ceremony, as he goes hunting, collecting forest honey and spends time getting to know his new friends, before they judge the time is right for his 'rebirthing' ritual. The drug, Bruce believes, acts on the areas of the brain where guilt and remorse lie buried, allowing people to see themselves as they really are, warts and all. His initiation starts as he is fed the tree root, prompting several hours of vomiting, said to purge the soul. His tongue is pricked with a needle to stimulate speech, while his Bwiti 'father' feeds strips of the root to him, singing softly. Bruce's recollection of the visions that follow include vivid memories of childhood, harsh recollections of people he had hurt, even inadvertently, throughout his life, and a sense of the Earth as a vast living organism in which everything is connected. The final phase of the journey sees the tribe dancing with fire and encouraging Bruce to make sense of the shapes he sees in the flames. After reviewing his visions, Bruce is determined to revisit a few people whose point of view he saw more clearly while under the influence of the drug, to apologise for any hurt he caused. Of his emotional experience with the tribe he says: 'They have given me something so special, I shall take a piece of this village [with me] wherever I go for the rest of my life.' |
