Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-8bljj Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-06-27T06:46:29.082Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Re-creating the Favela in O homem que copiava by Jorge Furtado

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 September 2022

Arthur Hughes
Arthur Hughes*
Affiliation:
Ohio University
Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

The Brazilian film director Jorge Furtado's O homem que copiava centers on two plots, both based on accepted social discourses: how to escape lower-middle-class poverty; and the perennial question of the obstacles to love. These two plots are intertwined when the love quest is made to depend on the former, that is, when success in love is predicated on success in social mobility. However, in making the film's protagonist black, Furtado inserts the question of race into these two discourses and highlights the discursive absence of race in dealing with the problems of poverty and race relations. The film underscores the role of education and the discursive implications of social representation in excluding marginalized groups from social mobility while exploring the underside of the mestiçagem myth, the role of race in the question of national identity.

Resumen

Resumen

Para su película O homem que copiava el director brasileiro Jorge Furtado se centra en dos tramas basadas en tópicos comunes del discurso social: cómo escapar de la pobreza de la clase baja; y la problemática de los obstáculos al amor. Las dos tramas se entrecruzan en esta obra cuando el éxito del segundo se hace dependiente de la habilidad en escalar los peldaños sociales. Sin embargo, la inserción del protagonista negro André insinúa la cuestión racial dentro de estos dos tropos, subrayando su ausencia retórica a la hora de encontrar soluciones a los problemas de la pobreza y las relaciones interraciales. La película hace hincapié en el papel de la escolaridad en la exclusión de grupos marginalizados del acceso al ascenso social, y el resultante efecto en la representación discursiva en diferentes esferas sociales. Al mismo tiempo se pone sobre la mesa el mito brasileño del mestizaje y su papel en la identidad nacional.

Type
Research Article
Information
Latin American Research Review , Volume 47 , Issue 1 , 2012 , pp. 64 - 77
Copyright
Copyright © 2012 by the Latin American Studies Association

References

Filmography

Cidade de Deus (2002), Fernando Mireilles.Google Scholar
Cidade dos homens (2007), Paulo Morelli.Google Scholar
O dia em que Dorival encarou a guardia (1986), Jorge Furtado.Google Scholar
Esta não é a sua vida (1991), Jorge Furtado.Google Scholar
Falçao, meninos do tráfico (2006), MV Bill and Celso Athayde.Google Scholar
O homem que copiava (2003), Jorge Furtado.Google Scholar
Houve uma vez dois verões (2002), Jorge Furtado.Google Scholar
Ilha das flores (1989), Jorge Furtado.Google Scholar
O invasor (2001), Beto Brant.Google Scholar
Notícias de uma guerra particular (1999), Kátia Lund and João Moreira Salles.Google Scholar
Palace II (2000), Kátia Lund and Fernando Mireilles.Google Scholar
Rear Window (1954), Alfred Hitchcock.Google Scholar
Redentor (2004), Cláudio Torres.Google Scholar
Rio Zona Norte (1957), Nelson Perreira dos Santos.Google Scholar
A Short Film about Love (1988), Krzysztof Kieślowski.Google Scholar

References

Azevedo, Aluísio de 1881 O mulato, translated by MacNicoll, Murray Graeme. Cranbury, NJ: Associated University Presses, 1990.Google Scholar
Bentes, Ivana 2003 “The Sertão and the Favela in Contemporary Brazilian Film.” In The New Brazilian Cinema, edited by Nagib, Lúcia, 121–137. New York: I. B. Tauris.Google Scholar
Conde, Maite 2006 “Screening Rio: Cinema and the Desire for ‘The City’ in Turn-of-the-Century Brazil.” Portuguese Studies 22 (2): 188–208.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Davis, Darién J. 1999 Avoiding the Dark: Race and the Forging of National Culture in Modern Brazil. Brookfield: Ashgate.Google Scholar
Hamburger, Esther 2007 “Violência e pobreza no cinema brasileiro recente.” Novos Estudos 78:113–128.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hanchard, Michael 1999 “Black Cinderella? Race and the Public Sphere in Brazil.” In Racial Politics in Contemporary Brazil, edited by Hanchard, Michael, 59–81. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.Google Scholar
Hasenbalg, Carlos, and do Valle Silva, Nelson 1999 “Notes on Racial and Political Inequality in Brazil.” In Racial Politics in Contemporary Brazil, edited by Hanchard, Michael, 154–178. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lund, Joshua 2006 The Impure Imagination: Toward a Critical Hybridity in Latin American Writing. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Lund, Joshua, and McNee, Malcolm, eds. 2006 Gilberto Freyre e os estudos latino-americanos. Pittsburgh: Instituto Internacional de Literatura Iberoamericana, Universidad de Pittsburgh.Google Scholar
Moutinho, Laura 2004 Razão, “cor” e desejo: Uma análise comparativa sobre relacionamentos afetivo-sexuais “inter-raciais” no Brasil e na África do Sul. São Paulo: Editora Universidade Estadual Paulista.Google Scholar
Perlman, Janice 2010 Favela: Four Decades of Living on the Edge in Rio de Janeiro. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Reichmann, Rebecca 1999 Race in Contemporary Brazil: From Indifference to Inequality. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press.Google Scholar
Telles, Edward E. 2004 Race in Another America: The Significance of Skin Color in Brazil. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Twine, France Winddance 1998 Racism in a Racial Democracy: The Maintenance of White Supremacy in Brazil. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.Google Scholar
Xavier, Ismail 2003 “Brazilian Cinema in the 1990s: The Unexpected Encounter and the Resentful Character.” In The New Brazilian Cinema, edited by Nagib, Lúcia, 39–63. New York: I. B. Tauris.Google Scholar
Xavier, Ismail 2006 “Corrosão social, pragmatismo e ressentimento: Vozes dissonantes no cinema brasileiro de resultados.” Novos Estudos 75:139–155.CrossRefGoogle Scholar