Severino (1978)

At his father Raymondo’s request, Severino has spent ten years living in the cities of the white people and now returns to the Manzanero Indian tribe. He wants to fetch his younger brother Blas so they can use his savings to run a peach plantation in the north. When he arrives in the village, Severino learns that his father was found dead six months earlier. The white settlers also claim that his father was a cattle thief, as more and more animals have been disappearing. The Manzaneros, under their chief Nicolas, are convinced that the white people are stealing their livestock, too. Nicolas intends to start a war against the settlers. Severino decides to stay and get to the bottom of the matter. The white sergeant explains to Severino that, in the long run, the settlers’ loss of livestock will mean losing their land. The cattle company can then buy it cheaply. On a journey through the Andes, Severino eventually discovers the remains of the missing cattle and realizes that bandits hired by the cattle company drove them into the mountains. Before Severino can tell his tribe, Nicolas and his warriors raid a herd of the settlers’ cattle, and from then on Nicolas lives in the mountains with most of the tribe. Since Nicolas has not renewed the contract for the Indians’ land, it is now at risk of being sold to the company. Severino, however, spends all his savings to keep the land, thereby also giving up his dream of a life in the north. Severino begins a new life in the old Indian village with Maruja, Nicolas’s granddaughter, who did not follow most of her tribe into the mountains. Nicolas refuses to accept this and plans to shoot Severino, but at the last moment Maruja throws herself in front of the bullet and is wounded in the arm. Later, Severino rides into the mountains himself and manages to persuade all the tribe members except Nicolas to return to the plains. The disputes with the settlers are settled. Summoning his remaining strength, Nicolas returns to the village once more to kill Severino. But before he can, Maruja shoots him.