Antônio Pitanga
Brazil has a long tradition of coup d'états. These coups would have not been viable without the support of the big media, particularly TV Globo. Two Brazilian journalists in the UK reveal the manipulative tactics of these organisations.
"A Day with Jerusa" follows Silvia, a young, mediumic market researcher facing the hardships of underemployment while awaiting the result of a public exam, and Jerusa, a gracious 77-year-old lady, eyewitness to the daily life on Bixiga, a neighborhood filled with ancestral memories. On Jerusa's birthday, while she waits for her family's arrival, the encounter between her deepest memories and Silvia's mediumship allows them to travel through time and realities common to their ancestry.
An older man begins to work in a modern dairy factory. He feels distant and does not identify with the place, the people and even the society. Little by little, he is approaching cows and oxen, transforming into an animal and returning to his ancestry.
Follows the story of Opinião, a theatre group created in 1964 during the early Brazilian dictatorship period to oppose the government through artistic performances. Considered the first left-wing response to the dictatorship, the group gathered now famous Brazilian artists such as Nara Leão, Maria Bethânia, João do Vale and Millôr Fernandes.
What does Brazilian cinema tell us? What does Brazilian cinema tell us about black actresses and actors? ‘Pressed, Ripped Apart’, a film by Fabio Rodrigues Filho, makes use of archival sources to retrieve the trajectory of black actresses and actors who, between absences and delimited presences, between the fallacy of a racial democracy – based on the harmony among Brazil’s diverse identities – and an erasure of identity, strain the history of Brazilian audiovisual and above all, our own history.
Barravento Novo depicts correspondences between Antônio Pitanga—a Cinema Novo actor seen here delivering lines from Glauber Rocha’s first feature, Barravento, from 1962—and his daughter, Camila Pitanga, a well-known actor and filmmaker working today.
This documentary investigates the aesthetic, political and existential trajectory of emblematic Black Brazilian actor Antônio Pitanga. He career spans over five decades, and he has worked with iconic Brazilian filmmakers Glauber Rocha, Cacá Diegues and Walter Lima Jr. He was a prominent figurehead and outspoken activist during the Brazilian dictatorship, a period of unrest in Brazilian cinema. Pitanga deep dives into the world of Antônio and the history of Brazil. The documentary was directed by his daughter Camila Pitanga, one of widely recognised faces in Brazilian television and cinema right now. The film is also a poem, and a tender ode to fatherhood.
A once-rich family of women in Rio de Janeiro must sell their mansion in order to keep their high standard of living, but the proximity to the slums disrupts business.
Flávio is a filmmaker who was famous during the 1970s, but who's now forgotten by the public. Urging to become relevant again, he's willing to try everything, even by methods in which he doesn't believe. A supernatural debt, however, may be compromising his career.
Zézé Gamboa's sardonic historical drama follows a good-hearted, apolitical con man who, on the eve of Angolan independence in the mid-1970s, pulls off a massive swindle at the expense of the Portuguese colonial administration — and soon after finds himself hailed as a hero of the national liberation struggle.
Lado a Lado is a Brazilian telenovela produced and broadcast by Rede Globo from September 10, 2012 to March 8, 2013. Written by Claudia Lage and João Ximenes Braga, with collaborations by Chico Soares, Douglas Tourinho, Fernando Rebello, Vellego Jackie, Nina Crintzs and Maria Camargo, script supervision by Gilberto Braga, directed by Dennis Carvalho and core general direction of Vinicius Coimbra, it starrs Camila Pitanga and Marjorie Estiano as the main characters.
Set in a small town in Pará in the heart of the Amazon, Cauby makes a living as a photographer. Soon he’ll befriend pastor Ernani’s attractive wife Lavínia and embark on an affair – a good portion of the film is dedicated to their passionate relationship. We will also learn of Lavínia’s baggage from her past – how she met her husband, her continuing love for him, and his supportive role. But when rumours of her affair with Cauby circulate, the conservative community do not look at it kindly, leading to tragedy, and their lives will never be the same afterwards…
The true story of a working class boy who moves to the nation's financial capital at a young age and becomes one the most influential politicians in Brazilian history.
After being forced into a marriage and enduring a humiliating work routine in the hands of his father-in-law, Zé Araújo becomes the mythical Ojuara, an unconventional hero devoted to debauchery.
Covering the last years of the famous Brazilian fashion designer in her doomed quest for justice, Zuzu Angel follows the case of her activist son Stuart's arrest, torture, murder, and subsequent corpse disposal by the military forces in early 1970s Rio de Janeiro, during the darkest era of Brazilian military regime and media censorship.
Aurélia, a young black woman who works at a factory and lives in a working-class neighborhood in São Paulo, is seeing Fábio Tavares, who gets involved with a racist neo-nazi group.
Apolônio Brasil was a cult pianist who used to play in nightclubs in Rio de Janeiro, in the 1950s and 1960s. Quite a character, Apolônio was loved by women, idolized by his audience and friends, besides being extremely high-spirited and charming. For all that, his brain is removed after his death and becomes the center of a dispute among an American scientist, Dr. Bóris, who wants to study it, his friends and his son Paluca. The film is an attempt to pay homage to the nightlife in Rio de Janeiro of the 50s, and to the "chanchada" a genre of musical-comedy typically Brazilian. - Written by [email protected]
The ideological conflict between Joaquim Bolívar, a young barber member of the Communist Party and the powerful Coronel Gaudêncio, a typical province political leader.
The film tells the story of an intuitive, adventurous man who loved his country and being Brazilian. This man fought to be loyal to himself. His music is a transparent portrait of his genius, intuition, freedom, adventure and passion for Brazil.
A movie about a Brazilian entrepreneur who rivalled American's richest man at his time, well-known Rockfeller. Irineu Evangelista de Souza in 1867 had $155.000 contos de reis, meanwhile the Brazilian Governement annual budget was 97.000 contos de reis. The movie shows his life from poverty to riches and back to poverty again, as is common in Brazil, rich people die poor.
"Portraits and excerpts from Brazilian films from all times. Actors, directors and images that affirm cinema."
When Cunda, a man living deep in the Brazilian rainforest, is bitten by a snake, he has a hallucination of four chimpanzees. Once he recovers, he is shocked to find the four chimpanzees waiting for him at home, and, believing them to be special, decides to take them to the city in order to sell them.
Dede (Guilherne Fontes) is a Brazilian teen who lives with his middle-class grandparents who are members of the local communist party. When his grandmother dies, his grandfather's health soon fades to the point where he can't speak or walk. The local party officials ask Dede to continue to family tradition and take over his grandfather's position of social authority, but when Dede is introduced to cocaine by his best friend Alpino (Marcos Palmeira), the attraction to drugs is more appealing to him than political activism.
Eternamente Pagu is a biographical film about Patrícia Galvão, best known as Pagu, a Brazilian political, literary and artistic activist. An important figure of the Brazilian Modernism, Pagu was also a militant for the Brazilian Communist Party after she married writer Oswald de Andrade. She broke up with Andrade and, as a journalist was arrested by the Dictatorship of Getúlio Vargas. After she left prison, she abandoned Communism in favor of Trotskyist Socialism, married Geraldo Ferraz, and started a career as theatre director.
A young model runs away from the set of a commercial spot she's filming, and enter the mansion of Araucaima, where its dwellers indulge in strange rites.
Two friends get rich running an illegal gambling business. But soon they start to compete, and become rivals.
Quilombo dos Palmares was a real-life democratic society, created in Brazil in the 17th century. This incredibly elaborate (and surprisingly little-known) film traces the origins of Quilombo, which began as a community of freed slaves. The colony becomes a safe harbor for other outcasts of the world, including Indians and Jews. Ganga Zumba (Toni Tornado) becomes president of Quilombo, the first freely elected leader in the Western Hemisphere. Naturally, the ruling Portuguese want to subjugate Zumba and his followers, but the Quilombians are ready for their would-be oppressors. The end of this Brave New World is not pleasant, but the followers of Zumba and his ideals take to the hills, where they honor his memory to this day. Writer/director Carlos Diegues takes every available opportunity to compare the rise and fall of Quilombo with the state of affairs in modern-day Brazil.
Fantasy comedy about Brazilian writer Oswald de Andrade, one of the most important icons of Modernism in Brazil. In the film, Oswald is played by two actors: Ítala Nandi, as his feminine anima, and Flávio Galvão, as the masculine half.
A public relations man is invited to guide an American millionaire during his stay in Rio de Janeiro. He gets involved in the most bizarre situations, from orgiastic mega-parties to confrontations with the police, meetings with drug dealers and movie stars, facing corruption and even murder.
Four Third-World Christs try to stop the American industrialist John Brahms in Glauber Rocha's experimental film inspired by Pier Paolo Pasolini's murder.
Jorjamado no Cinema foi feito para um programa de televisão consagrado ao escritor Jorge Amado. Nesse documentário, Jorge Amado é filmado em sua casa, rodeado por sua numerosa família; numa livraria, durante uma sessão de autógrafos de um de seus livros, em um cinema em Salvador, na avant-première do filme Tenda dos Milagres, de Nelson Pereira dos Santos, adaptação do livro homônimo de Jorge Amado. Glauber filma seu amigo com muito humor e carinho. A câmera vai evoluindo lentamente, sem cessar e com rapidez sobre o escritor, seus familiares, atores e atrizes do filme de Nelson, além de passar por objetos de rituais de candomblé que constituem o museu de Jorge Amado.
A Deusa Negra is a love story that spans two centuries. In 18th century Yorubaland, Prince Oluyole is taken prisoner in the course of internecine warfare fanned by overseas slave traders. He is sold into slavery in Brazil. In present day Nigeria, at his father's deathbed, the young Babatunde promises to go to Brazil and search for traces of their once-enslaved ancestors. Beginning with a Candomblé ritual, his journey takes him ever deeper into this culture and, in a dream-like sequence, affords him a deeper understanding of his ancestors' suffering and powers of resistance. Balogun effortlessly links present with past, real with magical worlds and discourse with trance. The hypnotic atmosphere is also heightened by the music of the Nigerian drummer Remi Kabaka, which plays with repetitive patterns and distortions.
After assaulting a Hollywood film crew, a group of residents of a community in Rio de Janeiro decided to produce a film that would express the reality of Brazil - with the theme of Inconfidência Mineira.
This controversial film from director Glauber Rocha records the funeral of his friend, major Brazilian painter Emiliano Di Cavalcanti.
Man leaves his family behind and moves to Nova Iguaçu, a poor and violent city in the outskirts of Rio de Janeiro. He tries to rebuild his life, but falls in love with a woman who despises him, which drives him mad.
A film that records the rehearsals of a Brazilian theatre troupe directed by Victor Garcia, and then the conflicts that break out as they tour Iran and France with a performance of Calderon's autos sacramentales. A problem with a scenery prop sparks a crisis in the group and the film chronicles this disaster.
Jorge de Oliveira is an Afro-Brazilian poet who works in a publicity agency in São Paulo. Torn between his rich white lovers and his black family and friends, Jorge's situation serves as a springboard to a discussion about racial issues in Brazil.
Joana is a sophisticated, beautiful woman, so she has a choice of lovers, and destinies. She will let down Pierre, the French consul at São Paulo, and with him the frivolity of tea-parties and comfort. Her wild inner-soul will develop into the wild forest surroundings of a landlord's farmhouse. To the extent she will defend her land like a 19th century owner - of lands and men alike.
Music manager has to get three of his artists together for a special show, but soon finds out it isn't an easy task.
A beautiful young woman living in an isolated fishing community on an island falls in love with an outsider, a train machinist. But her father, a violent religious fanatic interferes.
European couple arrive at the Republic of Maraguaya with a strange mission. But the involvement with a local man, whom they hire as an employee, will change their plans.
Ângela Carne e Osso (Angela Meat and Bone), a young nymphomaniac, lives surrounded by delinquents, and exerts intense allure on them, dominating them all with her erotic power.
Edson is having an affair with a left-wing aspiring movie director during Brazil's military dictatorship years. He tries to get some easy money for her film, but ends up being arrested and tortured as his torturers suspect he's involved in a plot to overthrow the militar government.
Luzia arrives in Rio with the expectation of a new life. In the big city, she meets Jasão, her fiance, a former cowboy, who had left the Northeast. But he pretends not to recognize her and Luzia, alone, is forced to accept the protection of Calunga, an unconcerned man for whom life is a fascinating adventure without character or remorse. After using her, he leaves her in the hands of Ignácio, to whom she asks for temporary shelter. But a reunion with Jasão awakens love again.
In colonial Brazil, boy is sent to live with some parents in a sugarcane plantation, after losing his mother. His adaptation will be difficult and painful.
Homeless children in the slums of Rio are driven out of their temporary shelters by ruthless gangsters in this somber drama. The kids survive by shining shoes, stealing, and cutting the strings of the kites to sell them later to others. Tired of life on the streets, one boy turns himself over to the police in hopes he will be sent to reform school in a last desperate attempt to survive. This feature from acclaimed Swedish director Arne Sucksdorff appeared at the 1965 Cannes Film Festival.
The film follows two men living in a Rio de Janeiro slum: a black shoe-shiner and a white mill worker.
A group of armed soldiers is sent to the Northeast of Brazil in an attempt to stop a famine-struck population from invading and stealing a food deposit in the dry backlands. While the alienation and insanity of people driven to hallucination by their latent hunger is conducted by the predictions of a religious figure, a truck driver observes the situation and remains torn between his friendship with the soldiers and his revolt against the lack of government action in fighting the misery that lingers over the region.
The life of a runaway slave who founded the Quilombo dos Palmares, an outlaw community of Brazilian slaves.
The psychology and life of Brazilian hitmen, common in the Northeast part of the country. In this particular case, the story revolves around a young and idealistic politician from Salvador, whom the enemies are eager to eliminate.
In Bahia, an educated black man returns to his home fishing village to try and free people from mysticism, in particular the Candomblé religion, which he considers a factor of political and social oppression, with tragic outcome.
Zé is a very poor man whose most prized possession is his donkey. When his donkey falls terminally ill, Zé makes a promise to Saint Bárbara: If his donkey recovers, he will carry a cross - like Jesus - all the way from his city to Saint Bárbara's church, in the state capital. Upon the recover of his donkey, Zé leaves on his journey. He makes it to the church, but the priest refuses to accept the cross once he discovers the context of Zé's promise.
Made in the famous "Água de Meninos" market, the greatest popular market in Salvador, Bahia, Brazil. Salvador is revealed without prejudices, from the world of high finance up to the sordid environment of exotic cabarets.
Presenting a portrait of the Bahian people this documentary captures their spirit, their music, their culture and their religion. It features rarely seen footage of unique Candomble ceremonies of the local religion which melds Catholic and African beliefs.
OUR DREAM is the biobiography of Claudinho and Buchecha, the most successful duo of the national melody funk in all times and the greatest icon of the genre in Brazilian popular music. The story of a friendship that becomes a force of overcoming and conquest. A film that shows how the rhythm and poetry of the periphery conquered Brazil. A real story full of fantasy. A musical feature, thrilling and entertaining, made of drama and tragedies, but also full of humor, surprises and redemption.
