Headshrinkers of The Amazon, directed by Osca Humphreys, went out in the UK on Thursday July 23rd 2009 on Channel Five… and is on NatGeo right now…

Headshrinkers is all about the Shuar people of Ecuador. The story is kickstarted by the discovery of some footage shot by an explorer in the 1960′s – which looks like it shows the only known footage of a genuine headshrinking ceremony, with a real human head being shrunk to the size of an orange.

On the way to find out what is really going on in the footage Piers meets the President of the Shuar, a battalion of jungle fighting specialists, a Catholic missionary who campaigns against headshrinking by converting the Shuar to Christianity, oh and a member of a lynch mob who is happy to talk about the day they dragged someone off into the jungle and “turned him into powder”…

The programme got some great reviews:

Some publicity:

Interview on Fox

The trailer on NatGeo:

…Interview on Real Radio…with the Real Guy Harris…

…Interview with Osca Humphreys and Piers Gibbon on Radio London:

How to shrink a human head:

NEW – Better version with the right music. Here are some favourite photos from the shoot:

Rocfoto took the best shots, and thanks to all the crew for taking photos on my Lumix LX3 as well. The music is a Shuar dance tune. Sadly, there was no room in the final edit for the Shuar dancing scene…

Credits
Director Osca Humphreys
Producers Kate Horne, Osca Humphreys
Presenter Piers Gibbon
Editor George Taylor
Directors of Photography Guillermo Galdos, Ian Watts
Original Music Glenn Keiles
Assistant Camera Cesar Perez
Sound Recordist Nick Walker
Junior Production Manager Amanda Barnes
Production Manager Deborah McTaggart
Researcher Olivia Simove
Head of Production Helena Tait
Executive Producers Judith Bunting, Ed Crick
Fixer Roc Cunyus

For National Geographic Channel
Exectutive Producer Michael Welsh
Executive Vice President of Content Sydney Suissa
A 2009 diverse Production Ltd in association with Five for National Geographic Channel
Thanks to everyone at Diverse TV and of course The Shuar for all their hospitality. Also to Richard Bielawski and the Bielawski family for the inclusion of the Bielawski Family Archive.

These shrunken head publicity cupcakes were specially commissioned by Dara Klatt of NatGeo!

Here’s a commercial for a Headshrinker toy:

FAQs…

Q: My family watched an episode of your Amazon show. After watching it, we then realized that we have one of those shrunken heads. My grandfather was in the military and was in Ecuador in 1960s & that is where he got it. Where can we take it to see how much it is worth?

A: Hi XXX
Thanks for watching Headshrinkers
I live in London so I don’t know of any head dealers in your part of the world. Actually I don’t know any head dealers anywhere! There was some new piece of legislation in the UK that meant trading in (even ancient) human body parts became a lot more complicated recently. I do remember hearing about someone who sold a shrunken head fairly recently in the USA so presumably it is still legal there.

Good luck with your search – and look out for Dining With Cannibals on NatGeo soon
Best wishes, Piers