WASTE LAND

Filmed over nearly three years, WASTE LAND follows renowned artist Vik Muniz as he journeys from his home base in Brooklyn to his native Brazil and the world’s largest garbage dump, Jardim Gramacho, located on the outskirts of Rio de Janeiro. Mixes art with social projects. Addresses issues such as classism.

Copy: M   Format: DVD   Language: Portuguese and English   Subtitles: Portuguese and English   Length:  99 minutes   Copy ID: 1441  Comments:  Source:

EL PAIS DE LOS PUEBLOS

Raca tackles racial inequality in Brazil, via the lives of three black Brazilians: Paulo Paim, the only black senator of the republic; Netinho Paula, singer and TV presenter, and Tiny dos Santos, Maroon activist and granddaughter of slaves. The filmmakers followed these 3 people for a number of years – people they consider are on the frontlines of the country’s race debate/divide – in an effort to bring something unique to the public.

Copy: 1   Format: DVD   Language: Spanish   Subtitles: None   Length: 42 minutes   Copy ID: 1451  Comments:    Source:

RACA

Raca tackles racial inequality in Brazil, via the lives of three black Brazilians: Paulo Paim, the only black senator of the republic; Netinho Paula, singer and TV presenter, and Tiny dos Santos, Maroon activist and granddaughter of slaves. The filmmakers followed these 3 people for a number of years – people they consider are on the frontlines of the country’s race debate/divide – in an effort to bring something unique to the public.

Copy: 1   Format: DVD   Language: Portuguese   Subtitles: English   Length: 104 minutes   Copy ID: 1438   Comments:    Source:

 

ORFEU

Title: ORFEU
Description: The legend of Orpheus and Eurydice is retold against the madness of Carnival in Rio de Janeiro. The story is enhanced by brilliant performances, thrilling music, and magnificent color photography.
Type: Feature Film
Year: 1999
Director: Carlos Diegues
Country: Brazil
Film ID: 10
Comments:
Created:
Copy: 1   Format: DVD-R   Language: Portuguese   Subtitles: English   Length: 112 minutes   Copy ID: 1032   Comments:    Source:    Price: 0   Acquired: 9/9/9999

JOGO DE CENA

Title: JOGO DE CENA (PLAYING)
Description: In this film, ordinary Brazilian women who have responded to a newspaper ad tell part of their life stories to director Eduardo Coutinho. In September of the same year, actresses interpret, in their own way, the stories told by those chosen. There are three levels of representation in the film. First, real people tell of their real lives. Second, these characters serve as a challenge to the actors. And third, some of these actors then act out or speak about their own real lives. This film was donated by Duke University Visiting Instructor Aaron Lorenz.
Type: Documentary
Year: 2007
Director: Eduardo Coutinho
Country: Brazil
Film ID: 795
Comments:
Created: 10/23/2013
Copy: 1   Format: DVD   Language: portuguese   Subtitles: English & Spanish   Length: 107minutes   Copy ID: 1424   Comments:    Source: Aaron Lorenz   Price: 0   Acquired: 10/21/2013

SEIS HISTORIAS BRASILEIRAS

Title: 6 HISTORIAS BRASILEIRAS
Description: ‘6 Brazilian Histories: Santa Cruz’ shows the development of an evangelical church in the Santa Cruz suburb of Rio de Janeiro Brazil and the transformations that the church has made in the lives its congregation. The director wanted to show point of views that are rarely shown in the news. The film was originally released as a television series in 2000.
Type:
Year: 2000
Director: João Moreira Salles
Country: Brasil
Film ID: 783
Comments:
Created: 5/3/2012
Copy: 1m   Format: DVD   Language: Portuguese   Subtitles: English   Length: 60 minutes   Copy ID: 1411   Comments: master copy for classroom use only   Source:    Price: 0   Acquired: 9/9/9999

DENYING BRAZIL

Title: DENYING BRAZIL
Description: A documentary film about the taboos, stereotypes, and struggles of Black actors in Brazilian television “soaps.” Based on his own memories and on a sturdy body of research evidence, the director analyzes race relations in Brazilian soap operas, calling attention to their likely influence on Black people’s identity-forming processes.
Subject: Cinema/Theater, History, Politics/Human Rights
Type: Documentary
Year: 2000
Director: Joel Zito Araujo
Country: Brazil
Film ID: 788
Comments:
Created: 10/16/2012
Copy: Master and Copy 1   Format: DVD   Language: Portuguese   Subtitles: English   Length: 92 Minutes   Copy ID: 1415   Comments:    Source: Art Mattan/ AfricanFilm   Price: 0   Acquired: 10/9/2012

CRISE FINANCEIRA

Title: CRISE FINANCEIRA: O QUE PENSAM A JUVENTUDE BRASILEIRA E AS TRABALHADORAS DOMÉSTICAS…?
Description: “Financial Crisis: Latin American Youth and Women Domestic Workers’ Views” interviews young people and domestic workers about the global financial crisis of 2008-present. Interviewees offer their opinions about the roots of the crisis and offer solutions. Part of 4-DVD collection, “Coletânea Gênero, Raça e Etnia.”
Subject: Economics/Development, Social Issues
Type: Documentary
Year: 2010
Country: Brazil
Film ID: 734
Comments: Part of 4-DVD collection,
Created: 2/21/2011
Copy: 1   Format: DVD-R   Language: Portuguese   Subtitles: English & Spanish   Length: 11 minutes   Copy ID: 1365   Comments:    Source: Donation: Kia Caldwell via UN   Price: 0   Acquired: 4/11/2011

JOGO DE CENA

Title: JOGO DE CENA (PLAYING)
Description: In this film, ordinary Brazilian women who have responded to a newspaper ad tell part of their life stories to director Eduardo Coutinho. In September of the same year, actresses interpret, in their own way, the stories told by those chosen. There are three levels of representation in the film. First, real people tell of their real lives. Second, these characters serve as a challenge to the actors. And third, some of these actors then act out or speak about their own real lives. This film was donated by Duke University Visiting Instructor Aaron Lorenz.
Type: Documentary
Year: 2007
Director: Eduardo Coutinho
Country: Brazil
Film ID: 795
Comments:
Created: 10/23/2013
Copy: 1   Format: DVD   Language: portuguese   Subtitles: English & Spanish   Length: 107minutes   Copy ID: 1424   Comments:    Source: Aaron Lorenz   Price: 0   Acquired: 10/21/2013

BABAS

Title: BABAS
Description: This is a documentary about the history of wet nursing among Brazilian families. The film is a reflection on how it had developed over the years in different contexts throughout the twentieth century, from black slaves nursing white children to mothers hiring a nanny. The film uses subjective narration, autobiographical elements, photographs, domestic footage, and newspaper ads to reflect on how genuine affective relationships are nevertheless influenced by a long-range history of racial oppression in Brazil. This film was donated by Duke University Visiting Instructor Aaron Lorenz.
Subject: History, Social Issues, Social Life and Customs
Type: Documentary
Year:
Country: Brazil
Film ID: 799
Comments:
Created: 10/25/2013
Copy: 1   Format: DVD   Language: portuguese   Subtitles: English   Length: 20 minutes   Copy ID: 1423   Comments:    Source: Aaron Lorenz   Price: 0   Acquired: 10/21/2012

RIGHT TO MOURN

About mothers who are fighting for justice surrounding the murders of their children by police in Rio.  The film looks at three massacres in particular, exploring these mothers’ stories and how they provide support to one another.

KEEPER OF PROMISES (O PAGADOR DE PROMESSAS)

Description: Zé is a very poor man from the Brazilian countryside. His most prized possession is his donkey. When his donkey falls terminally ill, Zé makes a promise to Saint Bárbara: If his donkey recovers, he will carry a cross – like Jesus – all the way from his city to Saint Bárbara’s church in the state capital. Upon the recovery of his donkey, Zé leaves on his journey. He makes it to the church, but the priest refuses to accept the cross once he came to know the context of Zé’s promise. Please note: this film does not have subtitles. It is not rated and includes scenes of domestic violence and some sexual content.

Copies: 1 (DVD)
Length: 90 min

CINDERELAS, LOBOS, E PRINCIPE ENCANTADO

Description: A documentary about the Brazilian sex trade, Cinderelas, Lobos, e Principe Encantado explores how poor Brazilian women, mostly black, are lured by middle-aged European men into traveling to Europe with them. European, American, or Canadian men feel that European, American, or Canadian women are too cold and unsensible while the Brazilian women look for the security and freedom that Brazilian men cannot provide. The documentary interviews Brazilian women who were previously sex workers and have now moved to Europe with white men.

Copies: 1 (DVD)
Length: 106 Minutes

AS AMÉRICAS TÊM COR / THE AMERICAS HAVE COLOR

 

Description: “Different skin tones, individual and collective stories. This is the content of the documentary, ‘The Americas Have Color: Afro-Descendants in 21st-Century Censuses.’ This documentary reconstructs the African Diaspora’s ties to the Americas and reveals the censuses’ strategic role for advancing the rights of Afro-descendants in Latin America. The documentary was conceived by the 2010 Census Afro-descendant Group, produced by TV Brasil International, and funded by UNIFEM Brazil and Southern Cone, through its Regional Gender, Race, Ethnicity, and Poverty Program.” Part of 4-DVD collection, “Coletânea Gênero, Raça e Etnia.”

Copies: 1 (DVD)

Length: 29 minutes

TERRAS

 

Description: Terras (“Lands”) is a documentary about the border of Brazil, Colombia, and Peru, located in the heart of the Amazon. On this triple frontier the twin towns of Leticia (Colombia) and Tabatinga (Brazil) form an urban island surrounded by forest. It is a region marked by a constant flow of people from diverse origins, where ancestral and contemporary cultures live side-by-side. Through photography and sound, Terras explores the concept of frontier beyond the territorial demarcations that divide nations. Immersing itself in the daily lives of the towns and their inhabitants, this documentary uses a poetic and reflective approach to reflect on the relationship and contact between different nationalities, ethnicities, and cultures.

Copies: 1 (DVD)

Length: 74 minutes

TRABALHO DOMESTICO, TRABALHO DECENTE

Description: "Domestic Work, Decent Work" portrays the reality of African descendants and indigenous women domestic workers in Bolivia, Brazil, Guatemala, and Paraguay in their quest for rights, respect, and dignity. The documentary highlights opportunities and challenges for these countries in promoting women’s economic rights and empowerment. Part of 4-DVD collection, "Coletânea Gênero, Raça e Etnia."

Copies: 1 (DVD)

Length: 31 minutes

ABRIL DESPAÇADO (BEHIND THE SUN)

Description: The Brazilian badlands, April 1910. Tonho is ordered by his father to avenge the death of his older brother. The young man knows that if he commits this crime, his life will be divided in two: the 20 years he has already lived and the few days he has left to live, before the other family avenges their son’s death. He is torn between fulfilling his ancestral duty and rebelling against it, urged by his younger brother Pacu. That’s when a tiny traveling circus passes through the vast badlands where Tonho’s family lives.

Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 92 minutes

AMERICAS: PART 2

Description: “Capital Sins” Part of a 10-part PBS series on the western hemisphere, this program examines the trajectory of Brazil’s economy from the mid 1960s through the 1980s, spotlighting the methods Brazil’s rulers chose to develop that country and how their choices affected the lives of ordinary Brazilians. Beginning with the rapid growth of the late 1960s and 1970s known as the “Brazilian Miracle,” it examines the cost of this growth in terms of the repression of the military regime of that period, as well as the growing inequality of the 1970s and the debt crisis of the 1980s. The transition to democratic rule in the 1980s is also covered. Interviews with members of the military regime and its opponents, including current President Luis Ignacio “Lula” Da Silva and politician Benedita Da Silva, complement the documentary’s narrative.

Copies: 2 (DVD and VHS)

Length: 60 minutes

AMERICAS: PART 6

Description: “Miracles are Not Enough” This program travels to Brazil and Nicaragua to observe the explosion of theological debate, social activism and spiritual revival that is changing a region where religion has long played an important role in society and politics.

Copies: 1 (VHS)

Length: 60 minutes

ART OF ELIZABETH BISHOP, THE

 Description: This is a documentary allows the viewer a glimpse into a Brazilian art symposium which celebrates the art and poetry of Elizabeth Bishop. The symposium occurs in Ouro Preto in Minas Gerais. Literary discussions and some presentation material included. UNC-Chapel Hill Brazil, 1999.

Copies: 1 (VHS)

AUTO DA COMPADECIDA, O

Description: The lively João Grilo and the sly Chicó are poor guys living in the hinterland who cheat a bunch of people in a small Northeast Brazil town. But when they die, they have to be judged by Christ, the Devil and the Virgin Mary, before they are admitted to paradise.

Copies: 1 (DVD)

Length: 104 minutes

BAILE PERFUMADO

 Description: The inhospitable backlands, or sertão, of northeastern Brazil was home to a fearsome group of social bandits – the cangaceiros. Among the most infamous of these outlaws, known by their hats covered with mystic talismans, was the bespectacled Lampião whose depredations became legend in the 1930s. The film portrays the filmmaker and photographer Benjamin Abrahão, a Lebanese immigrant, who captured the elusive bandits with his camera.

Copies: 1 (DVD)

Length: 93 minutes

BENEDITA DA SILVA

 Description: A profile of the first black woman ever to be elected city councilor and member of the Brazilian Parliament from the favelas of Rio de Janeiro. Bene, as she prefers to be called, has lived her entire life in the favelas and worked for twenty-five years as a domestic servant before beginning her public life in 1982, when she won a post as city councilor and was elected a federal MP in 1986. She now devotes her efforts to fighting the racism and discrimination faced by Rio’s slum dwellers, and comments from community leaders and residents show the love and respect she has earned.

Copies: 1 (DVD)

Length: 29 minutes

BISPO DO ROSARIO

Description: This docudrama about the life and art of the Brazilian artist Arthur Bispo do Rosário takes the artist’s imagination as its viewpoint. Bispo spent 50 years in a psychiatric hospital in Rio and his art was almost completely unknown before his death in 1989. He is now considered one of Brazil’s most important artists.

Copies: 1 (VHS)

Length: 46 minutes

BRAZIL

Description: This film highlights some of Brazil’s most impressive features. From economics and industry to geography and culture, this documentary serves as an informative introduction to a country unlike any other. It focuses on major cities like Sao Paolo, Rio de Janeiro, Brazilia and Salvador da Bahia, while also placing emphasis on the country’s rural culture and diversity.

Copies: 1 (DVD)

BYE BYE BRASIL

Description: A small-time traveling sideshow plays over 9,000 miles of backcountry Brazil, a mixture of primitivism and progress. One of the most original and entertaining films of recent years, it is an exotic, entertaining, exuberant, and often very moving film by Carlos Diegues.

Copies: 1 (DVD)

Length: 110 minutes

CANUDOS: PAIXÃO E GUERRA NO SERTÃO DE CANUDOS

Description: Produced by Ricardo Gaspar and Selma Santos under the auspices of the University of Bahia and the Brazilian Ministry of Culture, this video depicts the history of the 1897 massacre of thousands of followers of a millenarian movement in the backlands of Northeastern Brazil.

Copies: 2 (VHS)

Length: 90 minutes

CARANDIRU

Description: Based on the real life experiences of Doctor Drauzio Varella as a social worker inside the Carandiru state penitentiary in Sao Paulo, the largest correctional facility in Brazil. Hundreds of prisoners live in degrading conditions while an elite group of prisoners rule the actual prison based on their own codes and laws. This rule ends in bloodshed in October 1992 when 300 policemen storm the facility and kill 111 unarmed inmates.

Copies: 1 (DVD)

Length: 145 minutes

CARMEN MIRANDA: BANANAS IS MY BUSINESS

Description: This film relates the intimate saga of the star who captured the world’s heart and imagination. It reveals the lasting image of Latin American women she created and serves as a celebration of her glorious talents. Using active footage, film fragments, interviews and dramatic re-enactments, acclaimed director Helena Solberg goes behind the scenes to convey the true life story of the “Brazilian Bombshell.”

Copies: 1(VHS)

Length: 90 minutes

CASA GRANDE & SENZALA (MASTERS AND SLAVES) PARTS I-IV

Description: A discussion of the 1933 text Casa Grande & Senzala(Masters and Slaves) by Brazilian anthropologist and historian, Gilberto Freyre, this documentary consists of four 1-hour segments. The camera follows Prof. Edson Nery, friend and biographer of Freyre, on an exploration of Brazil’s colonial past that blurs the lines between history, art, and the social sciences. In addition to explaining the circumstances of colonization it also examines the darker, sensual side of Brazil’s past in an attempt to define what the country is today.

Copies: 1 (DVD)

Length: 120 minutes

CENTRAL DO BRASIL

Description: One of Brazil’s most acclaimed films and winner of a Golden Globe for Best Foreign Language Film. Inside Rio de Janeiro’s Central Station, two very unlikely souls are about to become inextricably linked. When a young boy witnesses his mother’s accidental death, a lonely retired schoolteacher reluctantly takes the child under her wing.

Copies: 2 (VHS and DVD) Length: 106 minutes

CHILD OF THE DARK

Description: Back in the 1960s, Carolina María de Jesus became famous in Brazil after publishing her diary Child of the Dark. In this video, the director Robert Levine introduces this book about the daily life of poor people in Brazil, using images (mainly pictures and pieces of art) of the favelas. Note: This video doesn’t have very good sound quality.

Copies: 1(VHS) Length: 15 minutes

CIDADE BAIXA (THE LOWER CITY)

Description: Deco and Naldinho are best friends in a constant struggle to earn an honest living in the gritty world of Salvador de Bahia’s Lower City. When a beautiful prostitute named Karina asks to hitch a ride, the twosome quickly becomes a threesome. To survive life in the Lower City, the trio must learn to accept each other as lovers, friends and enemies. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 98 minutes

CIDADE DE DEUS (CITY OF GOD)

Description: In the midst of the streets of the world’s most notorious slum, Rio de Janeiro’s “City of God,” a frail and scared young boy will grow up to discover that he can view the harsh realities of his surroundings with a different eye: the eye of an artist. In the face of impossible odds, his brave ambition to become a professional photographer becomes a window into his world and ultimately his way out. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 130 minutes

CINE MAMBEMBE (CINEMA DISCOVERS BRAZIL)

Description: A pair of filmmakers journey to the interior of Brazil, screening short films to audiences in town squares. From Bahía to the Amazon, they discover a vast country going to the movies, seeing themselves on the big screen for the first time. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 56 minutes

CINEMA, ASPIRINS AND VULTURES

Description: In 1942, Johann, a lonely German, travels through the Northeast of Brazil in his truck selling aspirins in small villages, using advertisement movies to promote the medicine. He meets and befriends a drifter but later must make a life changing decision between homeland and friends.

Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 99 minutes

COMO ERA GOSTOSO O MEU FRANCÊS (HOW TASTY WAS MY LITTLE FRENCHMAN)

Description: This delicious black comedy, set in the jungles of Brazil, tells the story of a French explorer who in vain tries to be accepted by the tribe of cannibals who has captured him. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 80 minutes

DEUS E O DIABO NA TERRA DO SOL

Description: This richly allegorical film, set amid bandits and prophets in arid Northeastern Brazil of the early twentieth century, is a classic work of cinema novo by one of Brazil’s premier directors, Gláuber Rocha. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 120 minutes

DIARIOS DE MOTOCICLETA (MOTORCYCLE DIARIES)

Description: The Motorcycle Diaries is an adaptation of a journal written by Ernesto Che Guevara when he was 23 years old. He and his friend, Alberto Granado are typical college students who, seeking fun and adventure before graduation, decide to travel across Argentina, Chile, Brazil and Peru in order to do their medical residency at a leper colony. The two best friends start off with the same goals and aspirations, but by the time the film is over, it’s clear what each man’s destiny has become. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 128 minutes

DONA FLOR E SEUS DOIS MARIDOS

Description: Funny, sexy, and intoxicating. A ribald folktale about a young widow, her respectable new husband, and her dynamic but dead first husband who refuses to stay buried, featuring the sensual Sonia Braga as Dona Flor. Copies: 2 (DVD and VHS) Length: 106 minutes

ENTREATOS

Description: This film documents the 2002 presidential campaign of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silvia for thirty days. The film is less focused on the public appearances of Lula and more on the behind the scenes action of the campaign team, including strategy meetings, private conversations, and family interactions. (2 disc set) Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 117 minutes

EU, TU, ELES

Description: Based on a true story, this film is set in the beautifully majestic landscape of rural Brazil. Darlene, a determined woman, abruptly uproots herself from her small town to find a man who can fulfill her desires. Three years later and still single, Darlene returns to her hometown and accepts a modest marriage proposal from her humble neighbor Osias. Before long, Darlene finds herself in a grueling work routine while Osias oversees from the comfort of a hammock. The film portrays Darlene’s struggle to find happiness and love in this isolated town in Brazil. Best Pictures and Best Actress at Cinema Brazil Festival. Official Selection 2001 Sundance Film Festival. Copies: 1 (VHS) Length: 107 minutes

FAVELA RISING

Description: Favela Rising documents a man and a movement, a city divided and a favela (Brazilian squatter settlement) united. Haunted by the murders of his family and many friends, Anderson Sá is a former drug-trafficker who turns social revolutionary in Rio de Janeiro’s most feared slum. Through hip-hop music, the rhythms of the street, and Afro-Brazilian dance, he rallies his community to counteract the violence and oppression. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 80 minutes

FILHAS DO VENTO

Description: Two sisters from the state of Minas Gerais are reunited after several years apart when their father dies and are forced to confront each other about the ill feelings generated by the hurts of the distant past. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 84 minutes

FIVE T.V. DOCUMENTARIES OF ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES

Description: Made by Lia de Souza, Brazil. Portugese. 1.CUL GERAI-Historias da Pedra Furada 2.Especial Ianomami 3.Wareté 4.Antártida 5.Alcatrazes Copies: 1 (DVD)

FOUR DAYS IN SEPTEMBER

Description: This thriller is based on the true-life events. In 1969, the MR-8 urban guerrillas kidnap the US Ambassador to Brazil (Alan Arkin) to demand the release of prisoners held by the military junta. The dictatorship’s secret police close in on the bungled operation while time runs out. Now, the diplomat’s life hangs in the balance, caught between a government unwilling to cooperate, and his fear for the captors themselves. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 107 minutes

FRONTEIRA, A (THE BORDER)

Description: The story of two Brazilian families who put everything at risk to cross the border into the United States from Mexico, in search of a better life. Having gotten over the first leg of their journey, they all confront unexpected obstacles as they struggle to both reach their goals and adapt to their new reality. They fight for their dreams with the same courage and determination with which they cross new frontiers that appear on their way. Entirely based on true stories that were compiled to make up this beautiful and moving story. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 106 minutes

HEAVIER THAN AIR

Description: This documentary challenges the popular understanding that the Wright brothers were the “first in flight.” It treats the life of Brazilian aviator Alberto Santos-Dumont and his mission to create “heavier than air” flying technology. Copies: 2 (DVD and VHS) Length: 38 minutes

HORA DA ESTRELA, A

Description: In this film based on the book by Clarice Lispector, Macabea is a young woman from the countryside of northeast Brazil who lives in the sprawling city of Sao Paulo. The mixture of bitter reality and gentle, humorous fantasy has been compared with the works of Fellini, Chaplin and DeSica, and earned Suzana Amaral’s first feature status as an instant cinematic classic. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 96 minutes

I WAS BORN A BLACK WOMAN (NASCI MULHER NEGRA)

Description: This film recounts the remarkable life of Benedita da Silva, the first Afro-Brazilian woman to be elected to Brazil’s senate. Her long history of struggle in the shantytowns, the women’s movement and the black movement created the base for her enormous popularity as an organizer, a politician and an international role model. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 44 minutes

ILHA DAS FLORES

Description: This is a hilarious but devastating film about values, the food chain, and the human condition. Ultimately, a Brazilian island where pigs eat first, and the people are fed what the pigs leave over provides an example of how arbitrarily we have arrived at the human food chain and system of exchange that we now know. Copies: 1 (VHS) Length: 15 minutes

KISS OF THE SPIDER WOMAN (BESO DE LA MUJER ARAÑA )

Description: Political prisoner Valentín Arregui and homosexual pederast Luis Molina share a Brazilian prison cell in this fantastical drama from Manuel Puig’s book by the same title. Molina helps pass time by recounting memories from one of his favorite films, a wartime romantic thriller that just may also be a Nazi propaganda film, in order to spur Valentin’s imagination and distract him from the brutal realities of political imprisonment and separation from his love. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 120 minutes

LUZIA

Description: Set on the vast and beautiful plains of central Brazil, LUZIA is a movie in the tradition of the American western. Luzia is a cowgirl caught in a clash between squatters and the powerful ranch owners. Her extraordinary rodeo skills and stunning beauty attract the attention of the landowners whose history of marauding returns to gain revenge. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 112 minutes

MANDA BALA

Description: An examination of corruption and class warfare in Brazil as told through the stories of a wealthy businessman, a plastic surgeon who assists kidnapping victims and a politician whose income relies on a frog farm. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 92 minutes

MASSACRE DO CORUMBIARA, O

Description: "O Massacre de Corumbiara" advocates the need for radical agrarian reform in Brazil through an emotional examination of a massacre of peaceful, landless rural laborers by the military police in the Amazonian state of Rondônia in August 1995. It includes testimony from witnesses to the massacre and provides a side of the story ignored or simplified by most of the mainstream press. Filmed by Georges Bourdoukan and the Chico Mendes Committee three days after the killings, the video brings the plight of landless Brazilians to non-Brazilian eyes. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 16 minutes

MORO NO BRASIL

Description: This film is a musical road trip deep into the heart of Brazil. Along the trip, the director showcases the diversity and richness of the Brazilian Music. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 105 minutes

ODO YA! LIFE WITH AIDS

Description: A poetic documentary exploration of efforts by members of the Afro-Brazilian communities in São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, and Salvador, Bahia, Brazil to combat the spread of AIDS by drawing from their own cultural and religious traditions.

Copies: 1 (VHS) Length: 60 minutes

ONDA NO AR, UMA (SOMETHING IN THE AIR)

Description: This is a comedy drama that captures the joy and sadness of life in much of South America. It is based on the true story of four friends who decide to install a communal pirate radio station. Called Rádio Favela, this station is erected in a shanty-town to give voice to the outcasts’ complaints. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 93 minutes

ORFEU NEGRO (BLACK ORPHEUS)

Description: The legend of Orpheus and Eurydice is retold against the madness of Carnival in Rio de Janeiro. The story is enhanced by brilliant performances, thrilling music, and magnificent color photography. Copies: 2(DVD) Length: 107 minutes

ORISHA TRADITION, THE: THE GODS IN EXILE

Description: A documentary about the mixture of Catholic and Afro-Brazilian religious traditions. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 30 minutes

OWNERS OF THE WATER: CONFLICT AND COLLABORATION OVER RIVERS

Description: The Xavante of central Brazil and the Wayuu of Venezuela are two indigenous groups who both face considerable challenges in their efforts to maintain control over and access to one of the most basic of natural resources, fresh water. In this compelling documentary an anthropologist from the United States collaborates with a member of the Xavante and a member of the Wayuu to explore the ways in which indigenous peoples are responding to threats to their environment and natural resources. The film focuses primarily on efforts by the Xavante to combat the deforestation and excessive use of agritoxins associated with the expanding Brazilian soy industry that threatens the viability of the Rio das Mortes as a viable water source. Through a focus on this particular movement, the filmmakers explore the close connection between the the goals of protecting our environment and defending the interests of indigenous peoples, as well as an growing solidarity among indigenous peoples throughout South America that is centered around mobilization with respect to environmental issues. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 34 minutes

PEÕES

Description: Workers from the industrial ABC region of the Brazilian state of Sao Paulo are interviewed twenty-three years after their strike led by Luis Inácio "Lula" da Silva. In 1979 Brazil lived under a dictatorship and the members of the metalworkers union were the first group of workers to organize a strike during the rule of military regime. Interviews of the workers who participated in this movement appear alongside footage of their demonstrations and narrative explaining the political and economic situation in Brazil at the time. Strike leader “Lula” da Silva was elected president of Brazil just as production of this film was being completed. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 84 minutes

PIXOTE

Description: Ten-year-old Pixote (Portuguese slang for “Peewee”) is one of three million homeless children in Brazil. Hauled off to a crowded detention center, wide-eyed Pixote witnesses rapes, beatings and other acts of random violence by both the guards and the inmates. With the tranvestite Lilica and his lover Dito, Pixote escapes from the reform school and embarks on a life of violence and crime. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 127 minutes

QUANDO O CRIOULO DANÇA

Description: This film by a young Brazilian woman deals with racism as it impacts and is expressed through the daily lives of black Brazilians. It demystifies the idea that Brazilian society is without racial prejudices. Bronze medal winner at the International Film and TV Festival of New York. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 50 minutes

QUILOMBO

Description: A handsome tale of revolution and conflict, set in the mid-1600s. Disgruntled slaves in northeastern Brazil leave their plantations and form Quilombo de Palmares-their own democratic nation in the jungle. This doesn’t sit well with the Portuguese landowners, who send in their troops to restore control. This historical saga is a stirring fusion of folklore, political impact, and dynamic story-telling, realized in vibrant colors and set to the pulsing beat of Gilberto Gil’s musical score. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 114 minutes

QUILOMBO , COUNTRY: AFROBRAZILIAN VILLAGES IN THE 21ST CENTURY

Description: Quilombo Country examines the communities established by runaway slaves in 19th century Brazil as they navigate the hazards of the modern world, observing the daily activities that allow the quilombolas to survive in relative isolation. This film also offers rare footage of two ceremonies and many other celebrations. Copies: 2(DVD) Length: 73 minutes

QUILOMBOS DE BAHIA

Description: Fantastic documentary about black communities in the State of Bahia. The Brazilian concept of Quilombos has come to mean the communities that were constituted out of the struggle of rebel slaves during the centuries of slavery, as territories of housing, resistance and social organization. These communities represented the enjoyment of autonomy by rebel slaves, as a reaction to white domination. Many communities now are impoverished and struggle to gain a suitable standard of living. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 127 minutes

REGINA VATER: SIX VIDEOS ON BRAZIL

Description: This video contains six segments in Portuguese with no subtitles. "Turning Sadness Inside Out" (1985, 18 minutes) is about Rio’s Carnival. It is basically a musical where the lyrics somehow cements the images. "From Brazil by Brazilians" (1993, 20 minutes) is an experimental video of interviews with five Brazilian intellectuals, mixed with street and country scenes. This segment also shows how Brazilians see themselves and how they feel about the European and American perception of them. "Tupi or not Tupi" (1988, 18 minutes) contains fragments of interviews with filmmaker Vera Figueredo, famous theater director José Celso Martines Correia, writer and scholar Antonio Medina, and American composer John Cage, regarding their feelings about Brazil and Brazilian culture. "Nature Still Alive" (1993, 5 minutes) is a short work about ecology and conscience, computer edited. This segment works in analogical and metaphorical discourse, and is the result of edited images of animals with Regina Vater’s "Nature Mortes" (collection of photographs). "Green" (1991, 30 minutes) is a film made for a video installation in the Royal National Museum of Antwerp in 1992. This film is about the destruction of America’s ecology and culture by the Europeans. At the same time, it deals with the foods America provided Europe with the discoveries. The last segment of this video (1993, unfinished) contains a fragment of an hour video recording most of Regina Vater’s art works from 1979 to 1993. In this video the artist reads a statement on her ideas about art. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length:

ROMANCE DA EMPREGADA (THE STORY OF FAUSTA)

Description: Betty Faria stars as Fausta, a quirky cleaning lady whose sexy swinging hips open the door to a more comfortable life. When an old widower breaks the ice and buys Fausta perfume and a drink, she sees a way out of her dead-end marriage and the shanty town that traps her. The bawdy sitcom hilarity of Fausta and her relationships are infused with a deeper message in the film’s startling conclusion.

Copies: 1 (DVD)

Length: 90 minutes  

SATORI USO

Description: A poet from the shadows, a filmmaker with no films and an enigmatic muse. Inspired by the work of Brazilian writer and poet Rodrigo Garcia Lopes, it is a sort of “false documentary” about the poet’s time in the city of Londrina in the fifties as told through the eyes of American filmmaker Jim Kleist. Neither the poet nor the filmmaker actually existed – they are both fictional characters. Satori Uso, the poet, was invented in 1986, and his haikus were published in the literary section of local Brazilian newspaper Folha de Londrina. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 17 minutes

SAVAGE CAPITALISM

Description: This blockbuster Brazilian feature uses soap-opera melodrama to tell the story of a beautiful romance between a reporter and a mining company executive. But the romance crumbles when the executive’s wife, long presumed dead, returns and drives the couple, the company, and the country to the brink of a national disaster. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 86 minutes

SEAMS

Description: Directed by Karim Ainouz, a young Brazilian American filmmaker, who traveled back to his home in Brazil to interview on film his five delightfully eccentric unmarried or widowed aunts on their views of love, family and marriage. These women all in their eighties or nineties seem more liberated and more at ease with certain issues than many people of today.

Copies: 2 (DVD and VHS)

SERTAO DAS MEMORIAS, O

Description: This film tells the story of two Sertanejos, the inhabitants of Sertão. Maria is the female reincarnation of Jesus, representing the strength of the Sartanejo women. She invites the Beatas (holy women) on a mission of prayer for which they journey through the countryside, witnessing social unrest among the population. Maria meets the hero of the peasants, the strong worker Antero whose history intermingles with hers. Through mythical dreams, visions, and stories heard along their journey, we witness the unfolding of Biblical prophecy in which Old Testament texts mingle with the folktales of the Sertão Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 102 minutes

SHOESHINE PRESIDENT, THE (O PRESIDENTE ENGRAXATE)

Description: Shot in streets of Sao Paulo, THE SHOESHINE PRESIDENT asks Brazilians what they think about their new president, Luiz Inacio "Lula" da Silva. From the heart of the celebrations, this film captures the heady atmosphere of history in the making–the most important chapter in Brazilian history for a generation. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 15 minutes

THE SOUND OF RIO: BRASILEIRINHO

Description: A musical documentary about choro, the first genuinely urban Brazilian music, which blended European, Afro-Brazilian and indigenous elements and formed the basis for popular musical styles such as Samba and Bossa Nova. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 90 minutes

STORIES OF MY GRANDPARENTS, THE

Description: The Stories of My Grandparents is a long-term project that brings to life the Mayan legends that are such an important part of the Yucatec Maya oral tradition. The project is inspired in Ana Rosa Suarte’s first attempts to put the stories that she heard as a child in video. Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 15 minutes

TEMPTATIONS OF BROTHER SEBASTIAN, THE

Description: The story of a Brazilian monk’s quest to be ordained as a priest against a backdrop of personal crises, war, and social collapse. Brother Sebastian confronts numerous obstacles, including his guilt at being raped as a child, his attraction for the beautiful, androgynous Gabriel, doubts about his faith, the torments of a mysterious demon, and the growing jealousy of the man who raped him, now a fellow brother in Sebastian’s order. The year is 2030.

Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 147 minutes

TERRA EM TRANSE

Description: One of the great art films of the Brazilian Cinema Novo, director Rocha’s 1967 work is a meditation on the ambiguities of political power, revolutionary ideologies, and the transformative potential of art. It is a satirical film, based on a real life politician. The political allegory follows its protagonist narrator, a fictional poet, as he recalls the events leading up to his demise.

Copies: 2 (DVD and VHS) Length: 115 minutes

TIETA DE AGRESTE

Description: A story about a young girl, Tieta thrown out of her house for sexual indiscretions, only to return 26 years later triumphantly as the rich and powerful widow of an industrialist. Tieta and Leonora, whom she introduces as her stepdaughter, inspire an upheaval in the Life of Sant’Ana. In the midst of all the uproar, the darkest secret of Tieta’s life is revealed and she is forced to leave the village once again. Feature.

Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 115 minutes

TREM PARA AS ESTRELAS, UM

Description: A young musician from the poor suburbs of Rio searches for his lost love. From Guadalupe to the cosmopolitan south zone, Vinicius embarks on an almost mythic urban odyssey. Vinicius’ journey, both tragic and comic leads ultimately to redemption. For having lost all innocence, he is redeemed by the irrepressible life-forces of poetry and the wailing of a single saxophone in a Brazilian night.

Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 103 minutes

VERA (1987)

Description: After having spent part of her life in an orphanage/reform school (where she learned that this is a man’s world), Vera attempts assimilation into polite Brazilian society. However, by the time she leaves the orphanage she is convinced that she is a man inhabiting a woman’s body. A movie about gender formation and deformation.

Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 87 minutes

VIDAS SECAS

Description: This film takes place in the years 1940 to 1942, between the two great droughts that devastated the Brazilian Nordeste (Northeast). The movie, based on a novel by Graciliano Ramos, is a meditation about the agrarian question and the problem of migration to the Northeast regions of Brazil.

Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 105 minutes

VIDEO NAS ALDEIAS

Description:A project organized by the Centro de Trabalho Indigenista in which different indigenous groups in the Amazon have been provided with video training and equipment. Uses include recording ceremonies for future generations, taping political discussions, recording the promises of government officials, and documenting their struggles for the environment and their lands.

Copies: 2 (DVD and VHS) Length: 10 Minutes

XICA

Description: A diamond rush in the 1700s transformed Brazil’s interior into a place of fabulous wealth and excess. In this unrestrained atmosphere, the slave Xica uses her iron will and her unique sexual talent to seduce her way into becoming the unofficial Empress of Brazil, lording it over her former masters and gleefully emptying the crown’s treasury.

Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 109 minutes

YAKWA: O BANQUETE DOS ESPIRITOS

Description: Documenting the most important ritual of the Enauêne-Nawê Indians, the seven months every year that the spirits of the dead are venerated with offerings of food, song, and dance so they will protect the community and bless it with an abundant harvest and great quantities of fish.

Copies: 1 (DVD) Length: 75 minutes