NEW YORK.- The Museum of Modern Art presents Premiere Brazil!, its sixth annual exhibition of contemporary Brazilian cinema, July 17 through 31, 2008. A collaboration between MoMA and the Rio de Janeiro International Film Festival, this series introduces New York audiences to original films by both new and established Brazilian filmmakers. The 10 feature and documentary films comprising this year’s selection demonstrate the vitality and depth of contemporary Brazilian filmmaking, ranging from Marcos Jorge’s Estômago: A Gastronomic Story (2007), a comic fable that also serves as a gastronomic allegory for ambition and survival, to Cao Guimarães’ Andarilho (Drifter) (2007), a story of three lonely drifters, the second installment in Guimarães’ ambitious trilogy on solitude. As in previous years, Premiere Brazil! also includes a rich variety of vibrant films about Brazilian music and musicians, including the international premiere of The Mystery of Samba and the world premiere of The Man Who Bottled Clouds, director Lirio Ferreira’s engrossing portrait of popular songwriter Humberto Teixeira. Most filmmakers will be present to introduce the first screenings of their films.
Premiere Brazil! is organized by Jytte Jensen, Curator, Department of Film, The Museum of Modern Art; and Ilda Santiago, Director, the Rio de Janeiro International Film Festival.
This year’s opening-night films are Marcos Jorge’s debut feature Estômago: A Gastronomic Story, a smartly constructed tale of food, power, and sexual betrayal, and veteran director Walter Lima Jr.’s Out of Tune, a seductive recreation of the 1960s music scene in Rio de Janeiro and New York that traces the birth of bossa nova through the ups and downs of a fictional band.
Other highlights include Basic Sanitation, The Movie, a lighthearted tale about the intersection of social activism and filmmaking; My Name Ain’t Johnny, in which the familiar perils of drug dealing and drug abuse are explored in a new light through expressive camera movement and inspired direction; and Sign of the City, an evocative ode to São Paulo in which a few lonely strangers find their paths converging in the night.
The flourishing Brazilian documentary scene is represented by Drifter, a hauntingly gorgeous portrait of human transience; The Xavante Strategy, the story of the Xavante tribe’s courageous attempts to keep their culture relevant; and Pindorama: The True Story of the Seven Dwarves, the amazing story of the seven dwarves of the Pindorama circus, which tours the poorer reaches of northeastern Brazil.
