World Cinema Report: Brazil

[Editor’s note: Over the course of the 2008 calender, IONCINEMA.com will be launching regional monthly news capsules from film journalists from around the globe and today we focus on a film nation that has had bragging rights since Walter Salles’ CENTRAL STATION and Fernando Meirelles CITY OF GOD. Bruno Bragança is our newest member to join the team – he’ll be reporting on the latest film offerings from his country and keeping our readers up to date with local and international news from the country that gives us great tans and some wicked football players.]

Brazil at Home:

Johnny kick-starts 2008

2008 began well to the Brazilian cinema industry. In a little bit more than a month, Brazil has a new hit: “Meu nome nao e Johnny” (My Name Ain’t Johnny). The movie, was released in a limited release, has gained a bigger distribution resulting in several weeks in highest positions of the charts. According to the website of the newspaper “O Globo”, the film tends to have a promising future, even better than the 2007’s hit “Elite Squad”, considering the number of the viewers in their first weeks. It’s already the 9th most viewed Brazilian movie in history. Still, there are no news about a possible international distribution but the box office looks like this (grossed 16 million reais ($9.4 million) and sold 1.8 million tickets by Feb. 17, in its seventh weekend.)

The movie, an adaptation of the biography with the same title, tells the story of João Estrella (Selton Mello), a middle class drug user that involves himself in the world of drug dealing and becomes one of the most important of the business. The film has gained a lot of notoriety because of its charismatic but politically incorrect main character.

The buzz, helped by the success of Tropa de Elite, was a decisive ingredient to its triumph. That turns out to be a problem to the last half hour of the movie: the sense of trying to show reasons why the movie was produced and why the public sympathizes with Estrella overlays the good story developed in its beginning. Still, the movie counts with the always nice interpretation of Selton Mello and a very good soundtrack.

****

Going outside

“Sings of the city” (from the director Carlos Alberto Riccelli and
written by his wife, Bruna Lombardi), after several awards in Brazilian
festivals and good reviews, aims for the international audiences. The
movie, that has recently premiered in the brazilian circuit, is the
first one the Lombardi sings as screenwriter (she also plays the main
character). For the task, she has told that Fernando Meirelles, the
most famous brazilian filmmaker in activity, might help her to take the
movie aboard.

The movie has the city of Sao Paulo as a background for the story of seven different nucleus of people shifting between solitude and compassion. Lombardi plays Teca, a astrology that hosts a radio show and tries to help her listeners at the same time that she has to deal with her own issues. With a solid screen and a great photography, “Sings of the city” is a film the grows little by little, without any pretension or insecurity.

Brazil Abroad:

U.S: It has been a breakout couple of months for Brazilian cinema in U.S theaters commencing with a NYC-L.A release of Chico Teixeira’s Alice’s House (read my interview with the filmmaker here), then followed by Brazil’s nom for the Academy award’s Foreign film category with The Year My Parents Went
On Vacation read (IONCINEMA.com’s interview with Cao Hamburger) and finally the just released City of Men from Miramax has received some fair reviews.

Out in a couple of days is Los Angeles’ first Brazilian Film Festival taking place between March 7th to the 9th at the Landmark Theater, Westside Pavilion. Marcelo Galvao’s Bellini and the Devil is having its world premiere. The fest will showcase a selection of Brazilian features, docus, shorts and sports-action pics.

Berlin Film Festival: Tropa de Elite (from Jose Padilha) has won the highest award, the golden
bear at the German film festival. The 2007 title, already a huge hit in Brazil, has gained a lot of attention from the
international press notably because of its socio-political text and Variety
classified the movie as “fascist”. Even with divided critics, the movie
won the award from one the most important festivals in the world.

The
film tells the story of the member of the Brazilian elite squad of Rio
de Janeiro, Captain Nascimento (Wagner Moura) that works invading
“favelas” and fighting the crime. It’s a social portrait of corruption,
power and hypocrisy.

Besides “Elite Squad” winning the top prize, Mutum, from the director Sandra Kogut, received a special mention by the jury. Adapted from the novel “Campo Geral”, from one of the most important names of the Brazilian literature, Guimarães Rosa, is a rural tale about the innocence and the tenderness of its main character, the 10 year boy Thiago (a moving and amazing performance of Thiago da Silva Mariz) and his relation with his family. The movie captures the essence of the childhood in an isolated and often hostile environment.

Cannes Film Festival: Early word is two of Brazil’s best filmmakers are headed to the festival: Walter Salles’ Linha de Passe and Fernando Meirelles’  Blindness are making the trip to the May-set film fest. More on this soon.