Memórias Póstumas

Memórias Póstumas is the movie that I chose to write about for my Brazilian Film class. It is based the book, "Memórias Póstumas de Brás Cubas", written in 1881 by Machado de Assis.

Basically, the protagonist, Brás Cubas, narrates his life story to you.... after he has passed away. The movie is filled with moments of subtle humor:

"Linda.... mas, coxa." ("Beautiful.... but lame.")

This is definitely a good one.. too bad you can only get it in Brazil!

Gabriela

Gabriela is another movie we watched and analyzed in our Brazilian Film class. It was released 1983 and based on a book called, "Gabriela, Cravo e Canela", written by Jorge Amado in 1958.

The story takes place in Brazil in the 1920's. Gabriela is a woman from the sertão (or deserts in the north east of Brazil) who travels by foot to a big city. A man named Nacib is enchanted by her when he sees her and hires her to cook snacks to be served at the bar he owns. Needless to say, they stir up a little romance... but I won't ruin the story.

Just one little aviso: there is quite a bit of female nudity in this one.

Como Era Gostoso O Meu Francês

Made in 1971. It's about two canabal indian tribes who eat their enemies. (The Tupinambas and the Tupiniquins)

Here is a link: How Tasty Was My Little Frenchman

Not the greatest movie in the world... But hey, it was for a class.

"Carandiru"

I really liked this movie. It was well-made, and the story was well-told. It is so sad, though, that this actually happened.

It is a story about how some 300 policemen killed 111 UNARMED inmates of a correctional facility in Brazil in 1992.

"Memórias Póstumas"

In case you couldn't tell, this movie is a foreign film. It's in Portuguese, though I'm not sure of its origin (Portugal or Brazil). The image on the right is the cover of the book on which the movie was based, I was not able to find the DVD cover.

The story is about a man, Brás Cubas, that lived in Brazil and Europe in the 1800s. He tells the story of his life himself, about 100 years after his death. I know it sounds weird, but it's kind of funny. Because sometimes you see his 'dead self' in the scenes along with his 'young self' and he can freeze them and start talking about the particular situation they were in etc.

The movie was interesting and had quite a few humorous parts. It's one of those good movies that doesn't need any extreme scenes to make it a good one. :) There are too few of those around these days.