A founding film in Brazil’s Cinema Novo movement, Nelson Pereira dos Santos’ artful Neo-Realism holds up extremely well.* Set in the 1940s, but with a timeless feel, it’s both fable-like and naturalistic, following an itinerant family (husband, wife, two young boys, irreplaceable dog) as they wander thru a desolate countryside looking for work. Finally finding a job, under near slave-like conditions, tending cattle & other livestock, they briefly see a possible future of stability only to fall again when temptation & pride leads them into trouble in town just before weather conditions turn against them. Even the dog is suddenly at risk. Surprisingly, Dos Santos’ leads are professional actors, but feel completely authentic, as does everyone else. No one more so than their dog, Baleia, one of cinema’s canine immortals. Moving, and never dreary in spite of the injustices & hardships.
SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: *Certainly compared to his better known HOW TASTY WAS MY LITTLE FRENCHMAN/’71, where Western Civilization ‘in ironic quotation marks’ meets Cannibalism.
DOUBLE-BILL: Often coupled with film like John Ford’s GRAPES OF WRATH/’40 and Satyajit Ray’s PATHER PANCHALI/’55, it’s probably closer to Jean Renoir’s THE SOUTHERNER/’45.
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