Extreme Tribe: The Last Pygmies

From the producers of the award-winning series The Tribe, the documentary series Extreme Tribe: The Last Pygmies provides a rare look into the lives of the remote Mbendjele tribe. Told from a unique female perspective, filmmaker Livia Simoka spends five months with this Pygmy community of hunter-gatherers living harmoniously within the jungle of the Republic of the Congo. 

Almost entirely cut off from the outside world and inaccessible by road, Livia is welcomed by a close-knit family who treat her as their own. She is fully immersed in their daily lives from sharing in unexpected tragedies to observing the significance of tribal traditions like female tooth sharpening. 

Traditionally the Pygmies are regarded as egalitarian, with women on a broadly equal footing with men, but as Livia gains insight into their common practices including polygamy, she reveals a darker truth where domestic violence and male domination is still prevalent. Over the months she learns of the Mbendjele’s unique ways of surviving in the isolated rainforest and also discovers threats to their way of life, both from hostile neighbours and a new road that is planned to be built through their land.