Chico: Brazilian Artist

Miguel Faria Jr.'s 2015 Brazilian documentary covers fifty years of Chico Buarque's work. The songs, the plays and the novels are treated inside the same narrative. Buarque himself is at the centre. He describes his working method, how a song gets built and the choices of words; the narrative gives this not as technical explanation but as a daily habit. The songs he wrote under the military government, and their censorship, form a section of their own. Archive recordings and concert footage take wide space, with figures such as Antônio Carlos Jobim and Miúcha appearing in older material. Who it's for: those who like Brazilian music and portraits of artists. Who it's not for: viewers expecting a critical biography; the documentary stands beside its subject and does not enter the contested passages.