At Play in the Fields of the Lord 1991

A pair of explorers, Lewis Moon and Wolf, find themselves stranded in Mãe de Deus, a remote outpost tucked in the deep Brazilian Amazon River basin, when their plane runs out of fuel. The harsh, foggy days and dense jungle become their only company as they drift through a landscape that tests their nerve and their loyalties.

The local police commander, Commander Guzman, wants the Niaruna tribe upriver to move their village to appease the gold miners and to keep peace with the provincial government. He makes Moon an offer wrapped in danger: bomb the Niaruna from the air to drive them away, in exchange for enough fuel to refuel their plane and permission to depart once the job is done. The arrangement is grim, coercive, and fraught with moral peril, setting the stage for a collision between violence, profit, and survival.

Into this tense world arrive the Quarriers—devout, determined evangelists. Martin Quarrier and his wife Hazel Quarrier come with their son Billy Quarrier, intent on spreading the gospel to the Niaruna. They meet fellow missionaries Leslie Huben and Andy Huben, who live with a Niaruna helper, and they’re drawn into the messier, messianic potential of faith in a place where belief can shape the fate of entire communities. In town, they encounter a Catholic priest who aims to re-establish a mission with the Niaruna, noting that the previous missionary was killed by them.

Moon and Wolf set out in their aircraft to strike the Niaruna, but when Moon witnesses the community up close and sees a native arrow strike the plane, he retreats from the plan, returning to Mãe de Deus with a shadow over his face. That night, after a charged discussion with Wolf, Quarrier, and the priest, Moon takes a native drug and begins to hallucinate. He launches away in his plane, parachuting into the Niaruna village. Moon, a half-Native American Cheyenne, is welcomed and accepted as one of the Niaruna gods, given the name “Kisu-Mu” in their language, and gradually adapts to their life and ways, shedding his former role in the outside world.

The four evangelists press upriver to establish their mission, while native converts who had once been aligned with the Catholic effort begin to appear, awaiting the arrival of the Niaruna. The scene expands beyond a simple clash of cultures as faith, fear, and ambition collide, and the Niaruna welcome the gifts the Quarriers bring—yet their stay is fleeting, and the future remains unsettled.

Tragedy strikes with the death of Billy Quarrier from blackwater fever, a severe malaria complication, leaving Hazel overwhelmed and fraying at the edges. Martin grows despondent, arguing with Leslie and gradually losing his faith, a crisis that ripples through the community and tests the resolve of everyone involved. Hazel is eventually returned to Mãe de Deus, her mind echoing with the pressures and sorrows of what has happened.

Meanwhile, Moon encounters Andy while she swims, an intimate moment that ends with a kiss and Moon catching a cold. He returns to the Niaruna camp and, in a desperate mistake, infects the village with the illness he carries. Moon and the tribe’s leaders go to the missionary Leslie to beg for drugs, seeking mercy in a landscape that offers little mercy. Leslie refuses, but Martin decides to help and travels to the Niaruna village with the missionaries’ young helper, hoping to bridge the gaps with relief. In the village, after Martin speaks with Moon, helicopters arrive to begin bombing. Martin survives the bombardment, but is killed soon after by his own helper, a brutal twist that underscores the perilous consequences of faith, ambition, and violence in a place where survival requires a hard, uncompromising measure of certainty.

As the smoke clears, Moon is forced to confront a harder truth: he is exposed as a man, not a god. The illusion dissolves, leaving him to run into the isolation of the jungle, alone and haunted by the choices that brought him there. The film closes on a note of caution about belief, power, and the costs of trying to rewrite a world in one’s own image.