Belo Monte: After the Flood is a documentary that explores the current situation in the Brazilian city of Altamira, and the surrounding Amazon region, now that construction on the Belo Monte Hydroelectric dam is complete and its reservoir flooded.
Belo Monte has been a lightning rod for controversy over the last 30 years that the government has sought to build the hydroelectric generating station.
Now that the Xingu River is dammed, and Belo Monte has started to generate its first electrical power, the government is still coming under fire and controversy surrounding this project has only grown.
After the Flood compares all the promises made by the government and dam builders while negotiating to build the dam to the situation today, through interviews with local residents, environmental and social activists and Indigenous Peoples.
While commitments to bring "progress" to the region were made by proponents of this multi-billion dollar project, the documentary shows an alarming series of broken promises and ignored mitigation measures that have led not only to disappointments, but in many cases, serious irreparable damage to communities and livelihoods.
After the Flood tells a horrific tale of shattered lives, government maleficence and in the case of the Juruna living a stone's throw from the dam, a charge of ethnocide by public prosecutors.
Still, the government has plans to build even more dams in the Amazon.
This documentary also touches on the Tapajos River, another major tributary to the Amazon River located in the Brazilian state of Para. There, the Munduruku are fighting to stop the government from building a dam on the Tapajos River and flooding a significant amount of their territory.
