COLUMBUS DIDN’T DISCOVER US
Indigenous Perspectives on the Columbus Legacy

Nationally Broadcast on Free Speech TV
Award of Merit, Latin American Studies Association
Chicago Latino Film Festival
San Antonio Cine Festival
Illuminations Film Festival (Montreal)

Directed by Robbie Leppzer
Edited by Felix Atencio-Gonzales (Quechua - Peru) and Robbie Leppzer
Field Produced by Wil Echevarria, Pedro Rivera, and Erik van Lennep
31 minutes • 1992/2020 Updated Digitally Remastered HD Version • Closed Captions
www.turningtide.com/columbus-didnt-discover-us

ABOUT

At a time of heightened public consciousness about Christopher Columbus’s legacy of genocide and enslavement of native peoples, Turning Tide Films releases an updated and digitally re-mastered HD version of COLUMBUS DIDN’T DISCOVER US on the 30th anniversary of the landmark First Continental Conference of Indigenous Peoples depicted in the film.

COLUMBUS DIDN’T DISCOVER US chronicles the historic gathering of three hundred indigenous activists from North, South and Central America who met in Quito, Ecuador in July 1990 to organize a cross-continental indigenous resistance to the Columbus Quincentennial.

U.S.-based documentary filmmaker Robbie Leppzer and his multicultural production crew were the only North American video producers invited by the organizers to document this historic event.

COLUMBUS DIDN’T DISCOVER US is a moving testimony about the impact of the Columbus legacy on the lives of indigenous peoples from across the hemisphere. Native people speak about the devastation of their cultures resulting from the European invasion, contemporary struggles over land and human rights, the importance of reviving spiritual traditions, and the need to alert the world to the environmental crises threatening the survival of the planet.

The film has been updated with a 6-minute opening montage of TV news reports depicting protests of taking down statues of Christopher Columbus in 11 U.S. cities in June 2020.

ADDITIONAL FILM INCLUDED

Also included is a short film by director Robbie Leppzer, FROM PLYMOUTH ROCK TO STANDING ROCK (20 minutes, 2017), a chronicle of Thanksgiving Day 2016, when over 1,000 people came to participate in the largest ever indigenous-led protest in Plymouth, Massachusetts, which was held in solidarity with the water protectors at Standing Rock, North Dakota. Every Thanksgiving Day since 1970, indigenous people and allies gather in Plymouth, Massachusetts, at the location where the Pilgrims landed in 1620, for a “National Day of Mourning.”

TOTAL RUNNING TIME: 51 minutes