‘SOFT COUP’ IN BRAZIL CREATES PROBLEMS ‘SOFT COUP’ IN BRAZIL FOR COUNTRY’S CREATES PROBLEMS FILMMAKERS FOR COUNTRY’S FILMMAKERS BY PATRICK BLAIR COPY EDITED BY NICOLE RICHARDSON
Over the summer, while the world was enjoying the festivities of the Olympic Games in Rio de Janiero, a political drama had been unfolding for months in Brazil. In May 2016, a conservative coalition of senators moved to impeach the country’s elected president, Dilma Rousseff of the Worker’s Party (PT), who had governed Brazil for over a decade. The move has been denounced as a “soft coup,” or a “parliamentary coup.” The official pretense was corruption and manipulation of budgets - a transparently cynical accusation, considering at least half of those who form the coalition that finally voted to impeach Dilma on August 31 are themselves embroiled in various corruption scandals. The unelected interim president, Michel Temer of the centrist Brazilian Democratic Movement Party, was acting as Dilma’s Vice president at the beginning of the impeachment process, before officially breaking their relationship in March when he joined a coalition of right-wing parties acting to remove the president. Temer assumed office unelected to extremely low approval ratings and angry protests. He saw three of his ministers ousted for corruption within a month of his administration. Temer himself and various other ministers of his and associates are implicated in receiving at least tens of millions of Brazilian reals in illegal contributions, among other accusations.
The consequences of this crisis are now being felt by the Brazilian film industry. At least two film projects from notable Brazilian filmmakers have been affected by the parliamentary coup. Aquarius, the latest film from acclaimed Brazilian director Kleber Mendonça Filho (Neighboring Sounds, 2012), is one of these films. Mendonça and members of the cast and crew of Aquarius made the news during last spring’s Cannes Film Festival, where the film competed for the Palme d’Or and received glowing reviews. At a red carpet reception, the cast and crew protested the coup by holding placards for the media - with phrases like “Brazil is experiencing a coup d’etat,” and “The world cannot accept this illegitimate government” - echoing street demonstrators in their home country. Not only has the new unelected government given Aquarius an 18+ rating (virtually unheard of in Brazil), the country’s Ministry of Culture rejected the film to compete for Best Foreign Film at the Academy Awards. Instead it picked a film titled Little Secret, which was described by respected Brazilian film critic Alcino Leite Neto in the New York Times as “one of the worst films of Brazilian cinema in recent years,” an “ocean of clichés and sentimentalism.” When the film critic Marcus Petrucelli - who has publicly denounced Mendonça for his outspoken politics - was appointed to the film selection committee, the other Brazilian filmmakers competing for selection withdrew their films in solidarity with Aquarius. Mendonça told Variety that he was afraid the film would be “sabotaged by the illegitimate government,” and his fears have proven true.
The latest project from Wagner Moura, the acclaimed Brazilian actor (recently lauded for his portrayal of Pablo Escobar in the Netflix series Narcos), has also encountered problems because of the recent political crisis. In a recent interview with Brazil’s OUL, Moura alleged that his project is facing a boycott from the country’s financiers. The film is set to be Moura’s debut as a director, and is a biopic of Carlos Marighella. Marighella is a famous figure in the history of Brazil’s radical left. He was a prominent communist lawmaker who became guerilla fighter against the country’s military dictatorship (1964-85). After a campaign of robberies and kidnappings (and penning his famous text Minimanual of the Urban Guerrilla), Marighella was killed in a police ambush in 1969. Moura explained the importance of this story for the people of Brazil whom he feels have been cynically misinformed by the country’s media, which he compared to FOX News in the US. Brazil’s right-wing politicians and intellectuals, some of whom have historical connections to the military dictatorship, still denounce Marighella as a terrorist. Moreover, the Brazilian ruling class, especially those represented by the right-wing opposition, are heavily dominated by finance capital. Meanwhile, the unelected Temer government’s feverish austerity agenda, which includes cutting the Ministry of Culture, is unlikely to make state funding a viable alternative even if ideological disagreements could be overlooked. As the Brazilian political landscape
References: Romero, Simon. "Brazilian Politics Smother a Film’s Oscar Ambitions." The New York Times. September 27, 2016. Greenwald, Glenn, and Erick Dau. "Brazil Congress' Sneak Grab at Self-Amnesty Shows the Deep Corruption of Its New Ruling Faction." The Intercept. September 20, 2016. Accessed September 28, 2016. Tapley, Kristopher, Shalini Dore, and Anna Marie De La Fuente. "Oscars: Controversy Erupts Over Brazilian Film 'Aquarius'" Variety. August 26, 2016. Accessed September 28, 2016. TeleSUR. "Brazilian Film 'Aquarius' Latest Casualty of Political Crisis." TeleSUR. September 13, 2016. Accessed September 28, 2016. TeleSUR. "Narcos' Star Says His Film on Brazilian Communist Faces Boycott." TeleSUR. September 18, 2016. Accessed September 28, 2016. Further reading on the political events in Brazil: Anderson, Perry. "Crisis in Brazil." London Review of Books 38, no. 8 (April 21, 2016): 15-22. Hoeveler, Rejane Carolina. "Don't Feed the Snakes." Jacobin Magazine. September 2, 2016. Accessed September 28, 2016. Ouriques, Nildo. "Sobre as Leis De Bronze Da Lumpemburguesia." O Real Não Se Vê. August 22, 2016. Accessed September 28, 2016. http://nildouriques.blogspot.ca/2016/08/sobre-as-leis-de-bronze-da.html. (In Portuguese.)