What’s so great about Las Acacias is that there’s so much to it with so little going on. Ruben is kind of grouchy, keeps to himself, and is definitely not so sure about doing this favour… even if it’s his boss the one ordering him to. When he meets Jacinta and baby Anahi for the first time, Ruben doesn’t really want them there.

That’s it! Take a road movie and throw in a baby, and chaos could ensue… except it doesn’t here. Ruben doesn’t like babies — I think a vast majority of non-parents can relate to that — or at least doesn’t seem to warm easily to this particular baby.

We don’t learn much about Jacinta other than her purpose and that she’s there with her baby, yet the setup to Ruben’s character is so smooth that we already feel like we’re the truck drivers in the story. We see him warming to both his guests just as we warm to them — if we didn’t find baby Anahi cute at the beginning, we soon begin to fall for her charms.

Las Acacias‘ ease to make us feel like we already know these people personally, the fluidity of how it moves from scene to scene like we’re part of this road movie is what probably got director Girogelli the three important awards at Cannes: La Semaine de la Critique, in which the film got the Young Critics Award, the Golden Camera, and the ACID Award given by a jury of directors.

Though the film is carried by German de Silva and his blossoming possible interest in Hebe Duarte’s character, it is baby Nayra who steals the film. I’m serious, baby Nayra should be nominated for an Oscar: Best Supporting Actress. Even before Ruben warms to Jacinta it’s his relationship with Anahi that really allows for him to step out of the dark, lonely shadow that he has been living under.

Las Acacias is in UK cinemas from 2nd December. You can see a list of cinemas screening the film here.

This review was originally published in YAM Magazine

It’s no surprise that the production of films featuring capoeira would eventually reach other continents, given the process of globalisation that capoeira has been through over the years and the appropriation of the art by the cultural industry. One good example is the Hollywood production, Only the Strong, released in 1993 and premièred in Brazil under the suggestive title Esporte Sangrento (Bloody Sport). As a worldwide phenomenon, the film reached young men and women all over the planet and inspired a whole generation to start practising capoeira.

In spite of what movies such as Only the Strong have done to popularise Capoeira on a global scale, what we find really interesting about films featuring capoeira and other expressions of Brazilian popular culture is their ability to produce an aesthetics of performance full of tropical exoticism, which has been constantly re-invented over the years. For instance, where would samba be today without the prominent figure of Carmén Miranda, who helped project the music style beyond Brazilian borders, conferring it the status of one of the symbols of our national identity. During the 1930s, Miranda participated in two important films, A Voz do Carnaval and Banana da Terra, in which she sings the famous song, “O Que é Que a Baiana Tem?” (What does the Baiana have?), written by Dorival Caymmi. The same happened with the tango, for instance, which had its Argentine-ness reinforced through the films of Carlos Gardel, during the first half of the XX century.

Samba and tango are good examples of how the phonographic and cinematographic industries have converged to exploit and promote symbols of popular culture, bringing audiences to the theatres, on the one hand, and selling records, on the other. Thanks to its ambiguous character – a blend of martial-arts, dance and music – it has been no different with capoeira. Judgements aside, it’s nothing new to say that the arts in general have used capoeira and other expressions of Brazilian popular culture as elements of artistic exploitation, at the same time that they re-invented a new aesthetics of these cultural forms. Need some examples? Just take a look at the paintings of Carybé and the photography of Pierre Verger.

As for the film industry, we could point out a number of national and international productions featuring Capoeira as their flagship: Vadiação, Dança de Guerra, Cordão de Ouro, Only the Strong, A Capoeira Iluminada, Mandinga in Manhatam, and Besouro, to name a few. Fly Away Beetle appears in this sequence. In a way, it is an extension of all of them, especially those in documentary format, even though it seems to pull back from traditional documentary style.

The film brings the testimony of three renowned masters, Boca Rica, Olavo dos Santos and Cobra Mansa. It also shows the true story of Roque Batista, a young men living on the streets of Salvador, Bahia, who turns to capoeira in order to save himself from destitution. The story is not at all unknown for us capoeiristas: capoeira as a tool for self-transformation and for bettering one’s life, and the strong connection of the art with the magical city of Salvador da Bahia, Mecca of capoeira and epicentre of Afro-Brazilian culture.

Besides the renowned masters, Roque Batista and two of his young capoeira students, Fly Away Beetle also features other characters which, in spite of not having a particular identity in the documentary, perform a very important role for the underlying discourse of the film. We are speaking of the capoeiristas which during the action shots perform blows and acrobatic moves in typical contemporary capoeira style. The exposure of the half-naked bodies and the urban/natural scenario of Salvador highlight a tropical-mulatto type of aesthetics. Most of these scenes take place outdoors, at some of the famous sights of the city and in public spaces, where kids play soccer, the baianas sell their products and capoeira co-exists.

Within the broader context of the film, the above scenes contrast with the testimonies of the older masters who, through their own stories and memories, take us back to a time when capoeira was persecuted, devalued, marginalised and despised by society. It is through this correlation between beautiful capoeira shots and the crude reality of its early stages – expressed though the testimonies of mestres Olavo and Boca Rica – that Fly Away Beetle presents us with a paradox and, certainly, what the film has of most importance. A practice developed by enslaved Africans in Brazil and their descendants – just like samba and other cultural practices not long ago derogatorily classified as “negroes’ pastimes” – completes its transition between opposite extremes. Capoeira is no longer seen by the elite as “one of the indications of our inferiority as a people”. It has reached the artistic scene and become one of the symbols of our national identity. Nonetheless, it is through the story of Roque Batista that Fly Away Beetle reminds us that, even though capoeira has reached Hollywood, the Afro-Brazilian population continues to be confined to poverty, destitution and marginality, needy of social projects or of a “lifeline” such as samba, football and capoeira to save them from social exclusion.

Additionally, it is worth mentioning the parallel between Fly Away Beetle and the myth of Besouro Preto or Black Beetle – the magical capoeirista who would turn into a beetle and fly away whenever in trouble. The legend of Besouro recently reached the screens of theatres in Brazil with the film Besouro. Besouro takes place in the old Bahia, and it introduces us to mestre Alípio who, just like Olavo, Boca Rica and Cobra Mansa, represents the figure of the old master, keeper of the traditions and master of Besouro. In the film/myth, Besouro spends most of his time in the wild tropical forest, where he encounters the spirits of nature and Afro-Brazilian Candomblé. The Besouro of Fly Away Beetle is Roque Batista, and its wild forest is the urban jungle of Salvador, full of dangers which can lead one into social disorder, chaos and marginalization. Roque’s magical element of metamorphosis of man into insect is capoeira; magical, black, racially mixed, tropical, ancestral, and ritualised in a world ever more secularised.

In spite of such obvious deconstruction, it is important to emphasise that capoeira has indeed made a great contribution to social projects with the objective of promoting the social inclusion of Afro-Brazilians and the strengthening of their self-esteem. Roque Batista is just one of the many Afro-Brazilians to whom capoeira has given life, either because he left behind a possible tragic end to become one of the disseminators of the art, or because Capoeira has enabled the cinema to reconstruct his narrative on screen.

The conversion of popular culture into an aesthetic object is a magic that the cinema knows how to do well, especially when sweetened by the no less mystical capoeira of modern times. It’s no surprise that the European première of Fly Away Beetle took place in two great post-colonial metropolises, Lisbon and London, where global audiences consume what is produced in the periphery of the world. After all, Roque and Roll are global products.

Words by Ricardo Cangaceiro

Ricardo “Cangaceiro” Nascimento is a geographer, Master in Sociology of Culture, Capoeira instructor, and is currently completing a PhD in Anthropology at the University of Lisbon.

Boni (Leonardo Machado), a dedicated student, joins a revolutionary group and must overcome his doubts and fears in order to be a part of what he believes in. He meets Cecilia, initially rejected by the group and labeled an airhead, proves to be brave and very supportive to her love. She also plays a key part of their future and of the “Grupo dos Setenta” (“Group of 70″), an infamous group of political prisoners incarcerated on an island. Freed by bargaining for the abducted Swiss ambassador they are exiled to Chile. Boni and the group find ways of keeping in touch with the situation back home but realize they must fully understand society in order to change it.

With great acting and beautiful direction from Paulo Nascimento, the film has you laughing one minute and on the edge of your seat the next.

For me, the beauty of the film lies in the personal transformation the characters go through. From passionate students to engaged man and women, this people had substantial influence on the outcome of the history. Many young Brazilians have heard stories from friends or relatives caught up in the mess of the military period – some more terrible than one can imagine. In Your Name doesn’t shy away from these subjects. The strength and realism of the characters continues throughout the film and leaves you with a sense of pride, knowing what these people went through in order to allow Brazil to enjoy the freedom it has today.

by Nara Paiva / Hugo Darley

In Your Name will be released in UK cinemas in September/October this year.

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The film’s subtitle “The Enemy Within” nicely predicts what comes next. Now, it’s not such an easy task to define who are the bad and the good guys, although the same dilemma persists in a corruption context. Elite Squad 2 takes place 13 years after the events of the first film, and José Padilha, the film’s director, made a smart choice approaching a recent subject: the Brazilian mafia (milícias) organised by the police that have been assuming the command of the “favelas” at Rio de Janeiro.

The first maximum-security prison in Rio de Janeiro, Bangu I, is the stage for the opening of Elite Squad: The Enemy Within. A prison riot commanded by a drug dealer, played by Seu Jorge (currently Brazil’s most popular artist abroad), is the doorway for the story’s development involving the characters Fraga, Mathias and Capitão Nascimento.

Fraga is a university professor and a defender of Human Rights, Mathias is one officer from BOPE – Special Operations Battalion, and Capitão Nascimento, the protagonist. After an unsuccessful end for the rebellion, Nascimento is fired, but in virtue of his admiration by the people, he is nominated to a role inside the State Public Security Department. In the middle of all this, Fraga marries Nascimento’s ex-wife. Herein is born a very complicated love triangle: beliefs, values and a child (Nascimento’s son).

If the first Elite Squad – awarded with the Golden Bear in Berlin – transferred, in a certain way, the violence resultant from the drug trade, without showing easy conclusions and following an European filming style, Elite Squad: The Enemy Within has as one of its aims to show a bigger picture involving violence, drug traffic and the society within the favelas, presenting this world in a “Hollywood” way, with less space for interpretation and conclusions.

The plot of the first Elite Squad was about the officer Mathias, and the second film is about Capitão Nascimento. The character is, nowadays, a type of an urban legend in Brazil, a grey protagonist that symbolises simultaneously the position of hero and anti-hero – loved by the population and hated by Human Rights defenders. Nascimento makes justice with his own hands although he doesn’t know why. He is not the redeemer; he is just the prophet of this announced tragedy. Above all, it’s all about protection and hope in a better future.

For some people, Capitão Nascimento is the “Brazilian Godfather”. Some people say that José Padilha’s films are fascist or even reactionary. They’ll also say that the film is too didactic. Some of them will say that it is reality disguised as fiction. But what is in everyone’s minds is that the Elite Squad films really do show a portrait of current society.

by Bruna Gala

Elite Squad: The Enemy Within is in UK cinemas from August 12th.

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Patagonia, directed by Marc Evans, takes this background as it’s starting point. Essentially it’s the story of two simultaneous road movies; the first of Rhys, a Welsh photographer setting off an assignment to Patagonia with his girlfriend Gwen in tow; and the second of Cerys, a Patagonian native on a mission to see the land which her mother had left behind. Her neighbour’s son Alejandro joins her, believing that he is simply accompanying her to Buenos Aires, but ending up on a flight to Wales.

It’s this tale of Cerys and Alejandro that contains the film’s heart. Cerys is the wise, knowing elder who has seen it all and fears nothing, Alejandro the naive youngster fearful of visiting a new country and the new experiences it will bring. For Alejandro then this is a coming-of-age story and for Cerys, who is beautifully played by Marta Lubos, it is a resolution. A circle that was started by her mother leaving Wales for Argentina is about to be completed.

In the other story, Gwen has decided to join Rhys on his trip to Patagonia in order to inject a bit of much-needed excitment into their relationship. With Rhys intent on working while in Argentina this does not go to plan, and with Mateo their horse-riding guide getting closer to Gwen, their relationship may in fact be under its greatest strain.

While the characters in the Welsh storyline are far more likeable, this is because they are at the extremes of life and so bring that classic “opposites attract” warmth to the film, whereas with Gwen and Rhys things are a lot more complicated. Their relationship and emotions are much more complex, reaching a point where the only way things can improve is for someone to get hurt. These two very different lives serve to complement each other very well. While a whole story of Gwen and Rhys could become slightly over-bearing I also feel that if it was just Cerys and Alejandro you could be looking at something approaching a caricature.

In both stories the scenery is stunning, and the difference between the green, rolling hills of Northern Wales and dusty, flat Patagonian landscapes have never felt so disparate. Add this to the superb acting, writing and direction, and you have an excellent film.

by Russ Slater

Patagonia is out now on DVD. You can buy the DVD from Amazon among other retailers.

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Whereas his first two features, Pepi, Luci, Bom (Pepi, Luci, Bom Y Otras Chicas Del Montón, 1980) and Labyrinth Of Passions (Laberinto De Pasiones, 1982) highlighted a newly found spirit of freedom, with its focus on the punk music scene, wild parties, drugs and sex and which helped Almodovar to make a name for himself as an exciting new film-maker; it was the subject matter and for many, the blasphemous content of Dark Habits, that established his reputation as the enfant terrible of Spanish cinema.

When Yolanda’s drug addict boyfriend dies from the heroin she supplied him, she is forced to flee her job as a cabaret singer and find a place to lay low for a while. She recalls the two admiring nuns who came to ask for her autograph after one of her shows and decides to pay them a visit. The Mother Superior welcomes her into the mission of the Humble Redeemers without hesitation. The convent has fallen on hard times: the Mother General, their spiritual leader lies dying in hospital, the place is falling down around them, and worse, the Marquise, their benefactress, has decided to discontinue the monthly annuity set up by her late husband, leaving them without an income. Yet for the Mother Superior the arrival of Yolanda is a gift from God: the nuns have not redeemed anyone for some time and the arrival of their new and only guest is an opportunity to restore the convent to the bustling haven of needy sinners – drug dealers, murderers, and prostitutes – that it once was. Yolanda is offered their best room: an opulent suite of pastels and satin bed-sheets, whose previous inhabitant, Virginia – intriguingly, the daughter of the Marquise – herself became a nun and later ran away to Africa where she was eaten by cannibals.

It does not take long for Yolanda to adapt to life in the convent, spending her time reading over the diary she stole from her deceased boyfriend and getting to know the other residents. There are six in total: the Mother Superior, four other nuns and the chaplain.

The nuns all have unique, bizarre sounding names that have been given to them deliberately by the Mother Superior in order to reinforce their vows of humility. But with little real work to keep them occupied, Sister Manure, Sister Dammed, Sister Snake and Sister Sewer Rat are free to spend their time indulging in their own idiosyncratic interests: Sister Manure cooks the meals in between bouts of LSD hallucinations; Sister Dammed cares for all the animals including a tiger that she has adopted as her son, and for whom she plays the bongo drums at mealtimes; Sister Snake, with the help of the chaplain, dresses the statues of the Virgin Mary, putting together seasonal collections in all the most fashionable materials; and Sister Rat of the Sewer writes racy novels based on the lives of the girls who have been redeemed at the convent, which she publishes secretly to great success under the pseudonym Concha Torres.

The Mother Superior herself, a heavy drug user and a lesbian who benefits from the fact her position allows her to make contact with needy and vulnerable young women, offers little in the way of moral guidance. She falls quickly and deeply in love with Yolanda, showering her with gifts and supplying her with coke and heroin, which the two take together until Yolanda decides she wants to give up the drugs and make a clean start. As Yolanda gradually distances herself, the Mother Superior is left to deal not only with her unrequited passion but also with the problem of how to safeguard the convent’s future.

It is easy to see why Dark Habits might have caused offense: it was rejected by Cannes Film Festival on account of its apparently sacrilegious treatment of religion, and although it went on to premiere at the Venice Film Festival it was not shown in the official selection given that some members of the organising committee considered it blasphemous and anti-Catholic.

Yet despite the controversy the film created, for many the irreverent tone and the humour of the outlandish situations must have been seen as a further breath of fresh air after so many years of austerity and repression. Franco was not only deeply supportive of the Catholic Church but was also, significantly, responsible for the closure of the National School of Cinema in Madrid (which meant that the young Almodovar had to teach himself the basic skills of film-making).

The new wave of films, part of the cultural movement with became known as La Movida, marked a new era of creativity and experimentation. Almodovar; like his nuns, released from the restraining hand of authority, lets his fantasies run riot and gives himself to the seductions of glamour. As a result, the film with its boleros, wild animals, kitsch décor and gaudy costumes appears to personify something between a seedy lounge bar and a circus. But underneath the carnavalesque atmosphere, there is a deeper message, one of compassion and understanding for the sinner: for, as the Mother Superior tells Yolanda when she questions her photo collection of fallen women, it is in the imperfect creatures, that God finds all of his greatness.

by Sofia Serbin de Skalon

Dark Habits was showing as part of the Good Morning Freedom! – Spanish Cinema After Franco season at BFI.

In Brazil, particularly from 1989 to 1994, Sundays were not lazy days, and Brazilians were not allowed to sleep until late. Sundays were Formula 1 Grand Prix days, days to see the man with the yellow helmet holding the green and yellow flag. This man was Ayrton Senna; a man who won three Formula 1 World Championships and kept the record for most pole positions from 1989 to 2006. Most of all, he seemed to have no fears and was a hero in a country, at this time, without any expectations. With a meteoric rise and a tragic death, he suddenly turned into a myth.

Seventeen years after Senna’s death at the 1994 Imola Grand Prix, the British director Asif Kapadia, Bafta winner, brings to the big screen the driver’s cinematographic life story, in a documentary that runs from the traditional structure rebuilding the docs’ concept, without the use of voice over and with just a few testimonies. More than investigate the car driver’s life, the film revives chronologically his ascension, passing through Formula 1 politics and Senna’s God-given talent.

Using images from TV, the FIA and Senna’s family archive, the film Senna also invites the spectators to know the man behind the wheel – a practising Catholic; patriotic, determined and intelligent, also capable of stopping his car during a race to help a colleague that was hurt.

By virtue of his determination to win, Senna was several times accused of being ruthless and to be a driver with no fair play. Born in a wealthy family from São Paulo, which was able to support his passion for the elite sport, the car driver always had to prove his ability – he was an outsider with no contacts and, instead of being the greatest, his aim was to be the fastest.

But, in real life, things were a bit different; it was not a matter of being a great driver or being good on a wet track, which he was. The world of Formula 1 was full of commercial and politic interests. Something Senna realised for the first time at the 1984 Monaco Grand Prix, when he took his limited Toleman car to the finish line first position. The result was cancelled and the French driver Alain Proust became the winner. Since then, Proust became his biggest rival, even when they were racing for the same motor-racing team, the British McLaren. When Proust left McLaren, one of his demands was not to have the Brazilian at the same team. During this time, Formula 1 was a magnet for journalists with a huge following watching Senna and Proust fight for the World Championship and for every pole position, inside and outside the track.

The “soap opera” Senna vs Proust reached huge ratings, but more important was Senna’s disagreement with the totalitarian figure of FIA Director, Jean-Marie Balestre, who, in a meeting with the drivers, after receiving a complaint from Senna in relation to the security of the cars, replied: “The right decision is my decision”.

The cursed weekend

The 1994 Imola Grand Prix was surrounded by a tense atmosphere caused by a car crash with Rubens Barrichello on Friday, followed by the deaths of the Austrian driver Roland Ratzenberger on Saturday and Senna on Sunday. Senna had just moved from McLaren to Williams and was not confident about the safety of his car. To show the sequence of the accident, Asif Kapadia made an option to use the car driver camera. For the spectators, it appears to be a simulation, but they already know the end. Inside the car of the ultimate risk-taker was found an Austrian flag.

The emotional atmosphere in the film becomes manifest after the tragedy. Senna’s tragic death ground Brazil to a halt, the government declared three days of national mourning, three million people followed the car containing the coffin in Senna’s hometown – São Paulo – and the Brazilian football team dedicated the World Cup title to their national hero.

Ayrton Senna was the last Formula 1 driver to die on the track. After his death, FIA cracked down on making the championship safer for the car drivers. He was right in his fears. But, in the end, it was all about passion.
Senna’s spirit can be summed up when he was about what he missed more. His answer was simple: “the World Kart Championship of 1978″. And why? “Because it was pure racing. Not politics”.

by Bruna Gala

After a great opening scene where our stars, Fabio and Naama, take their first trip in a boat, the story then hits a sandbank and stutters slightly, mainly because some of the narration is a little on the patronising side.

Even putting aside the fact that the film’s main audience might be surfers and/or those interested in Brazilian culture, I think it is fair to say that anyone with any smattering of general knowledge would know a bit about the favela situation in Rio, or if not, be able to work it out through the powerful footage and eyewitness accounts from its residents in the film. So too would the non-surfer be able to understand from the images that a younger surfer, full of the rashness which comes with his age, would not necessarily see the harm in cutting up another and stealing his wave, though he may not know the technical vocab. We don’t need the situation spoonfed to us.

Fortunately, the great thing about this film is that for the most part, the narrator keeps quiet and the characters and scenery are allowed to speak for themselves.

Periodically we are reminded of the importance of the philanthropic actions of the Rio Surf School, an organisation run by experienced surfers who have had varying degrees of sponsorship success in the past. Without its efforts, few of the kids ‘from the hill’ would be able to borrow boards and surf at all. The aim of the school is to give kids a hobby to keep them out of drug trafficking and to host surf competitions which give the otherwise directionless youngsters something to aspire to and work towards. The project happens with varying degrees of success. One of the founders encourages the children to try church, to see what it’s like. He is adamant that “A wave is God carrying you along in his hand,” while the two kids merely pray for better waves the next day.

More difficulties with their approach are highlighted when they pass a rule that only children attending proper education can use the equipment. Fabio and Naama attend despite some initial reluctance, and then realise that from where their classroom is, they can see whether or not the surf is any good, and whether school is worth skiving.

When the narration lays off and interviews take over, we are allowed more into the strange psychology of Fabio and Naama. Their voices are yet to break, and yet they can speak authoritatively on gang procedures: “If you screw up, you’re dead,” says Naama, giggling. “They shoot you in the head and they’ll throw you in the pit.” Fabio is more sensitive, his father was killed when he tried to leave the gang, so he tells us. And he plays the typical part of the unhappy teenager, struggling to cope with his complex emotions by grabbing his mates in headlocks.

It might be seen as harsh for the school to hold up the golden carrot of sponsorship to these kids, knowing that so few of them will realise their dreams in that way. The film is ultimately quite pessimistic as even the actions of the Surf Club cannot quite save Fabio from the influence of the bad crowd. Naama predicted this all along. Something about his temper and his history made it so: “He is a little…unloved.” Naama, despite living in poverty, we can see is fated to do OK. Like lucky children across the world, he has a supportive family background and generally a more positive outlook on life.

The film’s real strength lies in its depictions of the beautiful landscape, the long shots of the steep cliffs, lingering footage of the deep blue splashing waves and the close-ups of the ecstatic smiles of the kids as they let the sunshine fall on their closed eyelids. The surfing which the school provides might not be a guaranteed springboard to a better existence, but the actions of the water, sand and sun can provide that ever-precious transcendental escape from the everyday world. And surely that is what any surf documentary should strive for: to explain to common landlubbers why surfing’s enthusiasts spend so much time in the water, looking for the perfect wave.

by Leo Nikolaidis

Rio Breaks will be in UK cinemas from Friday 3rd June. To find out more information about the film go to riobreaks.com.

This resulted in Arriaga being banned from the Cannes film festival the year Babel was screened and an open letter published by Iñárritu and other colleagues on the film in the Mexican magazine Chilango where they denounced Arriaga’s “unjustified obsession with claiming the sole authorship of a film”.

Following the row, each went their separate ways: Arriaga looking to Hollywood to direct his first feature The Burning Plain, an intricately layered story based on his own script and starring Charlize Theron and Kim Bassinger; Iñárritu in contrast, turned his lens inwards, and back to familiar territory, to plunge the murky depths of the modern metropolis. The result is Biutiful, released on DVD this month, Iñárritu´s first Spanish feature since Amores Perros.

Set in Barcelona’s underworld, a far cry from the boutique shops and chic hotels frequented by pleasure-seeking tourists, Biutiful centres on Uxbal (Javier Bardem, winner of the Best Actor Award at Cannes for his performance) a corrupt variant of a human resources manager: a trader in illegal workers. Acting for his morally questionable Chinese boss, Uxbal is the link between colliding cultures, from the North Africans who sell their dubious wares on the street, under constant threat from the Spanish police, to the Chinese workers confined to the warehouse where they live out their slave-like existence, and the unscrupulous men ready to exploit them.

I’s a bleak and hostile world but one that Uxbal tries to negotiate with dignity and compassion for those he is obliged to exploit. In part, this is the product of his fatherly sensibilities: he is custodian of his two small children, Ana and Mateo, as their alcoholic and bipolar mother Marambra (played by the excellent Maricel Álvarez), is completely incapable of looking after them. But Uxbal is also influenced by a rare gift, an ability to hear the dead speak before they depart from the world. When Uxbal discovers that he himself does not have long to live, this need to make good and resolve his responsibilities becomes even more poignant, despite the almost insurmountable obstacles against him.

In a talk he gave presenting the film at last year’s London Film Festival, Iñárritu described how the world he chose to depict in Biutiful was deliberately harsh, nonetheless the film does not feel like a morality tale. Essentially it is about the frailty of one man as he struggles to face his own terrible demons and make peace with his surroundings. As he approaches his death Uxbal re-examines his relationship with his absent father – the man who left his mother to go to Mexico just months before he was born, never to return.

There is something in the wistfulness and longing of that relationship that he transmits to his own children beyond his concern for how they will survive without him: the desire to be remembered and to be loved. While the film does not have the charged pace of his earlier Spanish-language work, the slower tempo makes it more contemplative; its haunting music (courtesy of the Oscar-winning Gustavo Santaolalla), sombre yet beautiful photography, even the moments of magical realism when we see corpses float through the air, all help to give the film a melancholy tone and the quality of an elegy, a constant reminder of the thin line that separates this world from the next.

It’s an intimate, personal film for Iñárritu – there is a dedication to his father in the closing credits – but it is also a collaborative one, amassing a range of talents including the Mexican Director of Photography, Rodrigo Prieto, Maricel Älvarez, his Argentine leading lady, and new screenwriters, Armando Bo and Nicolás Giacobone, also from Argentina. As a result, Biutiful transcends beyond its lyricism as Iñarritu shows us once again what he does best, creating an authentic spell-binding world that we have been lucky enough to glimpse, and one which leaves us with the feeling that we have learnt something important about human nature.

by Sofia Serbin de Skalon

Biutiful will be released on DVD on May 16th

We have two copies of the Biutiful DVD to giveaway. If you’d like to enter the competition click here

Selton Mello’s depiction of Jean Charles – who was mistaken for a terrorist and consequently murdered by Scotland Yard in London five years ago – is just average. Vanessa Giacomo provides one of the few refreshing aspects of the film: she is very touching as Jean Charles’ cousins, Vivian, conveying a solemn, subtle sadness and a true sense of alienation to her immigrant experience. Other characters are highly cliched: the camp gay friend, the greedy Asian restaurant owner, the imbecile immigration officer and the inarticulate country bumpkin.

Confusingly, the director states in the opening that the film is “inspired by a real story”, and yet he depicted the most important events of the Jean saga in London as close as possible to reality. This includes the moment Jean Charles is shot inside a train at Stockwell station. Various locations and character names throughout the film were also preserved. The result is a jumble of actual facts and clumsily fabricated and embroidered storylines – a cinematic zorse (a morbid crossing and zebra and horse).

Some scenes are unnecessary, unrealistic and grossly crafted and enacted, such as when Jean and his builder friends are rewarded for their hard work with a group of busty prostitutes and a sex party unravels, or when Vivian encounters an old acquaintance and is seemingly surprised by his effeminate looks and bulky black boyfriend.

There is a succession of glaring bloopers and blunders, far beyond the innocent continuity error. For example, Jean Charles’ cousin Vivian inexplicably masters English, and a large building job worth a whopping £80,000 is completed to perfection by Jean Charles and his friends in less than two weeks – the period between the London bombings and Jean Charles’ death.

Sidney Magal’s live performance – a Brazilian singer from the 1980s who has long fallen into near-obscurity – adds a rare spark of originality to the film. It celebrates tacky culture and offers a return to a primal, unpretentious root of Brazilian pop culture.

Goldman’s intentions in making a film about Jean Charles and reminding us of the impunity of his killers are praiseworthy. He was also well-positioned to do so, being a Brazilian immigrant in London. He worked hard to obtain funds from the UK Film Council as well as support from British legend Stephen Frears. But the film has not even obtained theatrical distribution in the UK.

The British film industry and British audiences are not to blame – I think that they would love to see a good film depicting the saga of the Brazilian electrician and the consequences of his untimely death. The problem is that Goldman’s film delivers neither an opinionated account of the events nor the touching story of an immigrant: it is simply a bad film.

By Victor Fraga