Through telling the story of Brazilian garbage pickers, called catadores, this documentary directed by Lucy Walker reveals the various facades of certain waste disposal and recycling methods.

Waste Land centers on the catadores who work at Rio de Janeiro's Jardim Gramacho, the world's largest landfill.

"Seventy percent of Rio's trash winds up in Gramacho, a vast island of garbage from which the pickers extract certain materials to sell to recyclers. Each catadore has a specialty - plastic bottles, for instance, or scrap metal. One woman even takes unspoiled meat and transforms it into on-site meals for the pickers, who live full or part time at the site," according to a San Francisco Chronicle article.

(Source: Waste Land [Boston Globe])