Culture Watch
Moro No Brasil
2002, Brazil/Germany/Finland, 105 min., subtitles
Director: Mika Kaurismäki (elder brother of Aki Kaurismäki)
A Finnish documentary about the rhythms of Brazil. Since the age of
15, Mika Kaurismäki has been entranced with this warm, colourful world
which transports him away from the barren landscape and aching cold of
Helsinki. Now, older and wiser, he’s lived in Rio on and off for ten
years and was thrilled at the opportunity to make a film about the
music of his spiritual home.
Across 4,000 kilometres over a period of two months the film crew sought out the roots of samba and its countless variations. We see how samba means something different in every part of the country; how it was influenced by the arrival of Africans and Europeans and how its rhythms connect people to the vitality of their culture despite extreme poverty, as well as to the religious ceremonies of their ancestors. This is not Caetano Veloso and the Tropicalia movement, nor the Chorinho jazz or Bossa Nova sounds, but an exploration of the oldest forms of Brazilian music, played by veteran musicians, many of whom remain unknown.
The film takes us dancing in
the favelas so we can begin to feel the strong emotion that Brazilians
themselves feel for their music. And it shows us how this rich ground
of different styles has influenced modern sounds including rap and
funk. Featuring over fifty performances, this is a passionate
documentary that grants the viewer unparalleled access to the diversity
and musical richness of Brazilian music so that it’s almost impossible
not to share the director’s enthusiasm.
A tour de force which we
guarantee will make you want to book a plane ticket to Brazil — or at
least run down to your local music store and buy a CD.
The Quiet Earth
1985, New Zealand, 91 min., Science Fiction
Director: Geoff Murphy
Recognitions
Best Director and Best Actor (Bruno Lawrence), Fantafestival, Rome, 1986; and just about every New Zealand Film and TV
Award, 1987.
Scientist, Zac Hobson (the remarkable Bruno Lawrence who also wrote the
script), works for Operation Flashlight a government-sponsored project
whose objective is to set up a worldwide energy grid through
manipulating time and space.
One morning Zac wakes up to find himself
completely alone; everyone in the world seems to have vanished in the
midst of whatever activity they were involved in at the time. He goes
in to work and discovers that the project has been activated causing a
fundamental change in the basic structure of matter. Wandering along,
he begins to enter the madness of alternating euphoria and despair at
his situation…is he the ruler of the world or should he commit suicide.
Then he encounters two other humans, a girl, Joanne (Alison Routledge),
with whom he promptly begins an affair, and a man, Api, who is a huge
Maori tribesman (Peter Smith) — a triangle which creates a different
set of tensions.
There are no vampires, no zombies, just a very simple
situation in which the three last people on earth have to learn to
trust each other and begin to figure out, “why them?” and how can they
save humanity from extinction. What would you do in their situation?
This is a film that is both thoughtful and intelligent, spiced with a
certain amount of humour, and with an ending that will leave you both
dazzled and puzzled – which in our view is as it should be. If you’re
a science fiction fan, don’t miss this lost gem.
Viridiana
1961, Mexico/Spain, 90 min., B/W, subtitles, Criterion
Collection
Director: Luis Buñuel (Un Chien Andalou, Belle de Jour, The Discreet
Charm of the Bourgeoisie)
Recognitions
Golden Palm, Cannes, 1961
Perhaps the key surrealist film of our times, Viridiana quickly
achieved notoriety when it was banned as blasphemous and its director
forced into exile by Spanish fascist leader Generalissimo Francisco
Franco. On the surface, the story is centred on the beautiful Viridiana
who is drugged and carried off to be deflowered by her uncle and
guardian, Don Jaime, on the eve of taking her final vows as a nun.
The experience leads to a decision not to enter the convent but to attempt instead to practice Christian ideals as a part of everyday life. However, Viridiana’s good and charitable intentions turn out to be badly misplaced — as is often the case with innocent, pious people trying to do good — and her efforts do not turn out as expected.
For the director, the tale is more of a framework on which to hang an exploration of the relationship between Christian ideals and the real world — one that could only be the work of a man with the culture of Catholicism etched deeply on his psyche. This is a search for a universal truth — no matter how cruel, heartless and even perverse that may turn out to be. And, true to form for a Buñuel film, it is presented as a magical suspense story that is at times wickedly ironic and even absurd.
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Angela Pressburger grew up in the film industry (father Emeric Pressburger made The Red Shoes, Black Narcissus and Stairway to Heaven). She has been been an international program consultant at the Vancouver International Film Festival for the past ten years, and has spoken about film and sat on festival juries in both Europe and North America. She has recently written Show It in Public! — a grassroots guide to showing film in public (www.showamovie.ca) and keeps busy writing reviews for her home video for discerning viewers website, MapToMovies.com
