Although many people are skeptical and do not believe that Brazil can host such a major event that attracts worldwide attention, even the global media has unanimously ridiculed it. And now the 2016 Rio Olympics have grandly opened. Despite the tight budget, the opening ceremony of the 31st Olympic Games was still exciting thanks to the collaboration of Brazilian literary and artistic celebrities such as Fernando Merrills, director of "City of God", and the stunning debut of supermodel Giselle Bündchen alone was enough to make the world remember this event.
Then, in the next 10 days or so, even people who don't usually pay attention to sports and don't like sports will always keep up with the latest news of Olympic events and know the latest number of medals in their country for the first time - I am the same, but I am now going to blur the boundaries between movies and the Olympic Games, and talk about the top three Brazilian movies and Brazilian movies.
How Brazil won 91 medals – the history of Brazilian cinema
Although a large number of local films that reflect Brazil's national conditions have made Brazil one of the most popular film markets in the world, it is not until sound enters the film field that Brazilian films have begun to erect their own signboards, although this sign does not bring too high quality assurance. The dominant film at the time was the Chanchada film (The Latin American dialect, meaning dirty and filthy), which was entirely a pompous genre of cinema, modeled after the Hollywood musicals of the same era, filled with singing, dancing, and burlesque performances.
Carmen Miranda, who later became a Hollywood star, was the epitome of such exotic films, and the genre seems to reinforce Hollywood's simple stereotypes of Latin America. As cinema has grown in Brazil, Chanchada films have become increasingly prominent, but have also begun to fall into vulgarity, impracticality, and drift further and further away from the reality of the country.
In the 1970s, Chanchada films began to waver, and Brazilian films gradually gained more acclaimed attention. Inspired by Italian neorealism, Brazil began a new film movement. Film became a cultural force that reflected social inequality, using the issues of poverty and crime as inspiration and the screen as a tool to reflect Brazil's social problems. And the film allows many artists to express their views on the social and political aspects of the country in their narratives, which is still a very striking aspect of Brazilian cinema to this day.
Unfortunately, with the popularity of television, Brazil, like many other Latin American countries where the film industry has been hit hard, has unfortunately not been immune to the charm of television, but fortunately, at least the quality of the national films it produces remains high.
Today, in Brazil, the enthusiasm for going to the cinema to see movies is once again high. With the popularity of the slum genre, José Patierha's "Elite Troops" series and "City of God" and other global hits have further contributed to the best-selling of Local Brazilian films at home and abroad.
Bronze Medal – "Bus 174 Incident" (Jose Patilja, 2002)
Bus 174 is one of the best documentaries of all time, telling the true story of a hostage-taking incident, digging out more in-depth truths beneath its surface. Sandro Rosa Donacicito boarded a bus in June 2000 with his pistol, intending to rob all the passengers in the car. After a passenger alarmed a nearby police car, Sandro hijacked the bus. The whole process was reported in real time by the media that day, which aggravated the situation, and many of the footage used in the documentary were real news reports. Lengthy negotiations dragged on and on, culminating in tensions, leading to a terrible and contentious outcome.
Although the remake of Robocop led by Jose Patilja was less than satisfactory, he was a great documentary filmmaker before that. This can even be seen in his best-known film, Elite Troops. Documentaries related to real events in life can often be hard to convince, as it can be infected and influenced by historical events and real people anyway. And Patilha's clever handling of Bus 174 is how to show us the full story behind Sandro.
He didn't just cover the hostages, but he delved further into the most important of them, giving the audience plenty of reason to believe that he was actually a victim. Sandro is the victim of the Brazilian government's neglect of the young group, and even more horrificly, he is also a victim of corruption in the police force (candelaria church massacre). The film does not seek to make him a hero or even an anti-hero, but rather to show how vulnerable he is in this social system that ultimately disappoints him.
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Silver Medal – "Black God, White Devil" (Glaubel Rocha, 1964)
Black God, White Devil is a pivotal work in Brazilian New Wave left-wing cinema. The story tells of a working-class farmer, Manuel, who kills his oppressive boss and then flees with his wife. With no direction, he became fanatical about different religions and cultures, once meeting a black Messianic sage who asked him to sacrifice a baby, and on one occasion he even joined forces with local bandits. Finally, Manuel suddenly understood that he did not need to be guided and followed the path of others, because his life was in his own hands.
Graubert Rocha used the role of Manuel to address the oppression faced by many Brazilians at the time, arguing that the film should be used to express opinions on the country's socio-political problems. Rocha's film looks at the working class and the rural landscape, and he uses the film as a spirit of optimism to show his fellow Brazilians what changes can occur, but that change requires them to make choices to decide their own destiny. With Black God, White Devil, he did just that.
Gold Medal – Street Boy (Hector Barbank, 1981)
"Street Boy" is an extremely important film, it is like a documentary, telling the story of a young boy named Bischot who is manipulated into a criminal career. Bissot, who was held in a juvenile penitentiary and could not withstand the extremely violent torture and abuse of corrupt prison guards, turned to drugs. After escaping with a few friends, it wasn't long before he returned to the old path of crime. The film shows an extremely pessimistic view of young Brazilians, clearly showing that they are manipulated by those who are supposed to help them, have no hope of escaping a criminal life, and have to commit crimes in order to survive.
Like a mirror of real life, "Street Boy" is Buck's best work. His fearless recounting of the life of a young boy on the streets of São Paulo is sad and deeply sad. The Actors in Buckbank are amateur actors, but they are authentic street boys. Unfortunately, the young protagonist Bissot, played by Fernando Ramos da Silva, was unable to escape the fate of the character he played. A few years after the film's release, the actor went back to crime and ended up dying controversially by a police officer, not much different from his ending in the film. [Dan Lewis]