The Laughing Alligator 1979

Overview

Merging the subjective and the objective, the autobiographical and the anthropological, The Laughing Alligator is a highly personal observation of an indigenous South American culture. Recorded while he and his family were living among the Yanomami of Venezuela, this compelling work distills Downey's search for his own cultural identity and heritage through the encounter between the Western family and the so-called "primitive" tribe. Challenging the anthropological view of the Yanomami as violen