Antonio das Mortes

In the parched sertão of northeastern Brazil, Antonio, a hired hunter, is summoned on a rumour that one of the cangaço bandits he killed years ago has returned. A landowner hires him. This time Antonio sees whom he is working for, and changes sides. The film is not interested in the western. It is interested in folk mythology turning into political narrative: it proceeds through songs, saints and figures of the sacred and the magical, and uses them as the language of class struggle. Scenes repeatedly leave realism for ritual. The form is theatrical and colourful: wide open ground, actors looking straight into the lens, folk music and dance. Glauber Rocha keeps the camera moving. Rocha directed; the film counts as a continuation of the Antonio character from his Black God, White Devil of 1964. It won Best Director at Cannes in 1969. One of the best-known works of Cinema Novo and the high point of what Rocha called the aesthetics of hunger. Maurício do Valle plays Antonio. Who it is for: viewers who like Latin American political cinema and unusual narrative forms. Who it is not for: anyone looking for a straight story. The film runs on symbols, explains no context and says little to a viewer without Brazilian history.