O Barato de Iacanga

Thiago Mattar's 2019 Brazilian documentary covers the music festivals held on a farm in the seventies. Under the military dictatorship thousands gathered in the countryside, and the event became a meeting remembered as a space of freedom. The subject is not only the festival but that it was possible at all. How an event of that scale could be held while assembly was restricted, who permitted it and why it was eventually stopped are all covered. The narrative rests on the memories of participants and musicians; because footage of the period is limited, photographs and sound recordings carry most of it. Figures including Gilberto Gil and Raul Seixas appear in the archive. Who it's for: those interested in Brazilian music history and counterculture documentaries. Who it's not for: viewers expecting a rich visual archive; little was recorded at the time and the film rests largely on testimony.