The Red Light Bandit

Jorge was born and raised in the shantytowns of São Paulo. He breaks into wealthy houses; he works with a red torch and the press names him the Red Light Bandit. The newspapers follow him, the radio reports on him and the city lives on the story. The narrative does not proceed straight; radio announcers tell it, newspaper headlines cut in, characters look at the camera and speak, and pieces of advertising are used. Jorge is caught in the end and the matter stops being a crime story. Rogério Sganzerla writes and directs; it is his first feature, made at twenty one. Paulo Villaça and Helena Ignez are in the cast. It is a Brazilian production. Its source is a real person; a thief named João Acácio Pereira da Costa filled the Brazilian press in those years. The film is counted among the principal works of the movement known in Brazil as Cinema Marginal, which set itself against both commercial cinema and the Cinema Novo before it. The narrative is deliberately dirty; the sound is degraded, the cutting harsh, and the film does not hide its low budget. It was made under the military government and builds a revolt of form rather than direct political statement. Its language is collage; western, crime film, documentary and news bulletins are used together. Its limit is accessibility; the narrative is closed and the plot hard to follow. Who it is for: viewers who like Latin American experimental cinema and mixtures of genre. Who it is not for: it is scattered, technically rough, and deliberately inconsistent.