Barren Lives 1963
In vivid images, the documentary-like story of a drover and his family in the northern badlands of Brazil during the drought. A family in the search of new hope and destiny.
In vivid images, the documentary-like story of a drover and his family in the northern badlands of Brazil during the drought. A family in the search of new hope and destiny.
A street vendor and a servant theater, newly unemployed, accidentally swap their briefcases trinkets for one of three bandits who just rob a bank. The chase, which also involves two "rapas" only ends when, aided by a chorus girl, unwittingly participating in a musical number of the show's theater company.
After the success of the first Brazilian space mission, a scientist intends to accomplish an even more audacious feat. His goal is to launch into space the Nationalist rocket II, this time taking two humans to the moon.
Upon learning that his rich dad is on the brink of bankruptcy, spoiled Vavá summons his friend Jandir with a plan to get some quick cash: they will blackmail an uncle of Vavá by taking compromising photos of his lover, Leda.
After visiting a fortune teller, Zulmira is informed that a blonde woman will threaten her peace. After talking to her husband Toninho, she suspects that her cousin Glorinha may be that blonde.
Poor boy treats a sweet lemon tree as his only friend, talking to it, and learning important values in the process. But one day the tree must be cut.
Simple-minded young woman cherishes the dream of becoming a TV star. But during the tests she gets inhibited, being helped backstage by a couple of clowns and her boyfriend, who trust her potential.
While trying to break an "animal game" gambling scheme, Det. Bartolomeu hits his head, and the gamblers convince him that he is one of them. But everytime he hears a whistle, he changes between gambler and policeman.
Based on real-life Brazilian bandit "Mineirinho", the film follows the story of Zezé, a man falsely accused by sensasionalist press of being a high-caliber criminal who suddenly becomes one of the most wanted men of Rio de Janeiro.
An extended research tour of US university film programs introduced dos Santos to the American avant-garde filmmakers, among them Jonas Mekas and Stan Brakhage, who would directly inspire his formally radical adaptation of an allegorical short story about adultery and colonialism by Guilherme de Figueiredo. Filmed in both Manhattan and Brazil and set against the background of the Vietnam War and its protests, Hunger for Love uses a rigorously abstract soundtrack and narrative structure to evoke the acute paranoia of the period building up to the December 1968 military coup that tipped Brazil perilously close to a conservative dictatorship. With its harsh critique of the decadent tendencies of the Sixties counterculture, Hunger for Love offers a key expression of the self-consciously “ideological” phase of Cinema Novo. -Harvard Film Archive
Partner in a haute couture house, Anacleto is a ladies' man who charms all his clients and employees. Despite being married, he cares little for his wife and is always secretly arranging meetings with other women, causing a lot of confusion.
Petrônio drives a bus and his friend Cabeleira is a ticket collector. When Petrônio's sister needs money to do a surgery they get involved with a film production company, where a psychopath is trying to be the protagonist of the movie.
Bonga is a bum who lives on the streets, alone and free, with no commitments, except for pulling off naive scams to get food. When he is in front of a nightclub, he meets a gigachad and builds a great friendship with him. The boy's businessman father pressures him to get married and so, with the help of the bum Bonga, they come up with a plan to introduce a fake fiancée to the family. But things don't go as expected, they get complicated, and at the time Bonga takes another friend he met on the streets and is in love with to his friend's house.