Antonio das Mortes [1969]

 Antonio das Mortes was Cinema Novo trailblazer Glauber Rocha’s direct sequel to his celebrated Black God, White Devil, and the final chapter in his political allegorical trilogy following Entranced Earth. The titular character from the earlier film – a brooding, weary and taciturn bounty hunter, played by Maurício do Valle – was made the central protagonist in this eccentric, esoteric and ferociously nihilistic blend of revisionist spaghetti Western, Marxist agitprop, mythologized folklore, and bold stylistic splashes. Shot in lush and lurid colours over long static takes, it begins with an ageing Antonio, haunted by his violent past, being hired by a blind and wealthy landowner (Joffre Soares) to kill a new outlaw (cangaceiro) in the country’s arid and impoverished north-east (sertão), in order make the region congenial for predatory American capitalists. Antonio, however, experiences a profound crisis of faith upon executing his target – especially when he realizes that he’s committed a grave injustice against the dispossessed by siding with their corrupt oppressors – and joins the resistance by launching a guerrilla against his sleazy employer, in the company of an idealistic schoolteacher. Carrying the melancholic memories of the legendary anti-establishment bandit Lampião, a revered and romanticized figure in that region, the film counterpointed genre elements with an operatic style and bristling revolutionary polemics for fierce and subversive anti-capitalist and anti-government critiques on power, class inequality, and obliteration of Brazil’s syncretic cultures. Rocha’s use of music, composed by Sérgio Ricardo, was particularly memorable – be it the absorbing and freewheeling Afro-Brazilian performances by the locals, narration through a longform ballad or an elegiac anthem on the “King of the Cangaceiros” Lampião. Rocha, unsurprisingly, was forced into political exile soon after by the military dictatorship.

Director: Glauber Rocha

Genre: Western/Revisionist Western/Political Allegory/Action/Adventure

Language: Portuguese

Country: Brazil