Black Orpheus (Orfeo Negro)
Directed by Marcel Camus
Written by Marcel Camus and Jacques Viot from a play by Vinicius de Moraes
1959/Brazil/France/Italy
Dispat Films/Gemma/Tupan Films
First viewing/Netflix rental
#360 of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die
[box] [last lines] Young Girl: [to Zeca] Play a song for me, please. Come on.[/box]
With music, color, and carnival who needs acting?
The story is loosely based on the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice. In legend, Orpheus, the son of the god Apollo and the muse of music Calliope, fell in love with the beautiful mortal Euridyce. They married but she died shortly thereafter. Touched by Orpheus’ sorrowful playing on his lyre, Zeus allowed Orpheus to seek his wife in Hades. She would be allowed to follow him back to the land of the living on the condition that Orpheus not look at her until she returned to the light. Orpheus could not resist temptation at the last minute and Euridyce vanished. He was reunited with her only in the underworld.
The film takes place in the favelas above Rio de Janeiro and in its streets at Carnival. Orfeo, the leader of one of the carnival groups, plays the guitar and sings so beautifully that he is said to cause the sun to rise. Mira, his girlfriend, as managed to cajole him into taking out a marriage license. But when Orfeo spots Euridyce, a naive girl from the country who is escaping a man who was trying to kill her, it is love at first sight. They enjoy a beautiful romance and carnival together but Euridyce is constantly in danger from a man in a skeleton costume.
Rio gets my vote for the most scenically beautiful city on the face of this Earth and the film is jam-packed with vistas taken from the slums overlooking its harbor. It is a riot of color as well, emanating from daily life, carnival and Candomble ritual . The music is a fantastic blend of sambas and bossa nova. The acting is stiff and the characters are superficial but it hardly detracts from the pleasure of being in Brazil for a couple of hours. Recommended.
Black Orpheus won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
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