Welcome to our exclusive interview series where we sit down with the voices behind our Latin America Travel Festival.
Discover what drives these travel experts, their unique connections to Latin America, and the stories that fuel their adventures.
Rory Jackson, Director of Bruce Parry’s Tribe
How did you get into documentaries?
I first started making documentaries at university, and later got myself a receptionist job at a TV company in London that mostly made cooking programmes. From there, I tried my best to find low-level work on the kinds of documentary films I wanted to make, working for experienced directors and learning the trade from the bottom up. In many ways it works like an apprenticeship, and I’ve been very lucky to learn from some incredibly talented filmmakers.
What was your biggest trepidation going into the jungle with Bruce Parry? How did you prepare for a trip like this?
I suppose there are two types of preparation before an expedition. Firstly, and most importantly, it’s an enormous logistical undertaking. This part of the north-western Amazon is not somewhere you can just buy a ticket to, so getting a film crew, supplies, and all the necessary equipment there was no small feat.
Frank Films had decided the best way to shoot the series was to use self-shooting directors like myself, keeping the crew to a minimum. Our team of six was able to integrate into the village, and I think that’s what makes the films feel like a true, authentic adventure.
With that comes a certain amount of risk and so my main trepidation was for my own safety — I’d just had my first son, who was only eight months old. Looking at high accident rates for the single-engine planes that would take us into the region, and working out the evac protocol if one of us were bitten by a fer-de-lance snake, was sobering.
What was your hairiest moment when you were there?
There was one moment when I was packing up my camera equipment into peli-cases to store them overnight at camp. (We had a roof but no walls, so everything had to be watertight.) I reached for my tripod and immediately froze, as I thought I saw one of the legs moving on its own. Turns out it was a very small but very colourful snake.
We immediately called for one of our Waimaha friends to come and take a look. He promptly took it to the bush on the edge of the camp, and killed it, telling us it was potentially deadly.
What was your biggest takeaway from the experience? Did you learn anything that stuck with you?
What really stayed with me from my time with the Waimaha was the perspective it gave me as a new father. The Waimaha have chosen to live a life closely connected to the natural world, and that seems to build remarkable resilience.
Children help forage in the jungle from a very young age, with four-year-olds running barefoot on forest paths carrying machetes. They seemed joyful, resilient, and deeply engaged with one another. It made me want to prioritise my own son’s connection with nature, and to be open-minded about what counts as “risky play.”
I’ve also learned that different ants have different flavours and that I personally prefer them when lightly toasted.
Where are you headed next? And why?
Most recently I’ve been exploring the world of anabolic steroids in a three-part BBC series called Confessions of a Steroid Gang, which is a very different programme altogether! For now, I’m taking some time to be with family while I wait for the next adventure to arrive in my inbox.
About Rory Jackson
Rory Jackson is a documentary filmmaker whose career has taken him around the world – from the jungles of the Amazon and prisons in South Africa to communities in Africa, Southeast Asia, and Latin America. He is known for directing films in complex, ands sometimes hostile environments, bringing back compelling human stories from difficult places.