Over the course of four years, Chão follows one of Latin America’s largest grassroots movements, the »Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra« (MST). For decades, the movement has challenged Brazil’s extreme concentration of land ownership, demanding agrarian reform, affordable housing and the right to a dignified life in the countryside. In the state of Goiás, around 600 families occupy a sugarcane plantation owned by a major corporation, in the heart of a region shaped by agribusiness and monoculture.
Filming from within the camp, Camila Freitas closely observes daily life, following key figures including Grandma, PC and other comrades. The dream of owning land becomes an everyday act of resistance: community meetings, political education, collective decisions, makeshift kitchens, children playing among barricades and the physical labour of turning occupied land into a habitable place. As negotiations drag on and the constant threat of eviction looms, the camp becomes a space of possibility – for solidarity, food sovereignty and a future beyond the extractive systems that wear down both people and the land.
Chão shows agrarian reform as a lived practice rather than an abstract programme – and asks the question: who owns the land and who has the right to remain on it? Between hope and exhaustion, the struggle becomes a school for co-existence, sustained by song, labour and mutual care.

Guest: Camila Freitas

Awards for ›Chão‹
Festival do Rio
Olhar de Cinema
International Filmfestival Innsbruck
Festival International Jean Rouch