A few years after filming Los ronderos, school teacher Eduardo Díaz Cuba filmed the feature film Rastros sangrantes (1990) in Chota, on VHS. The film depicts the invasion of private land by a group of homeless people. The eviction and imprisonment of their leaders trigger a series of dramatic events that shift the plot from social realism to melodrama. The film adapts the novel of the same name by the Chota-born writer Andrés Díaz Núñez.
Lucia (Natassja Kinski) is a volatile, exciteable young woman. She forms a romance with Carlo (Stefano Dionisi), who is somewhat callow and is very skittish.
Ref'at is a judge who is ruling on an important case that witnesses a lot of security interference. Rafiq Al-Henawy has him killed and stages it as a suicide before the ruling.
Joseph Mnwana arrives at Heathrow on a flight from Johannesburg and asks for political asylum. But what is he fleeing from? The authorities are suspicious, and Joseph has an uncertain future in store.
Andreas, who is ten, has been brought up by his grandmother. When she dies, he removes a putto from the crucifix placed upon her, puts it in his mouth and does not speak again.
