/ARTS WEEKLY/FILM-BRAZIL: When a Flooded Town Is a Laughing Matter

By Mario Osava Reprint | | Print |

Mario Osava

RIO DE JANEIRO, Feb 24 2004 (IPS) - The fictional town of Javé is to be flooded by a dam that Brazil’s authorities claim will generate electricity “and progress”. The uprooting of its residents would be a sad tale, but it is told in a new film with such humour and human warmth that film-goers have no choice but to laugh.

And this “tragicomedy” continues to rack up awards. Earlier this month “Narradores de Javé” (Storytellers of Javé) won best film at the Punta del Este International Film Festival, an annual event at the Uruguayan beach resort.

“Narradores de Javé” portrays many aspects of little-known rural Brazil: populations expelled from their homes by megaproject hydroelectric dams, the oral histories maintained by storytellers, rampant illiteracy and the naive malice of rural culture.

It is a profoundly Brazilian film in that much of the dialogue is not translatable, which is why its popularity in Uruguay and at the Rotterdam Film Festival last year in the Netherlands came as a bit of a surprise.

Director Eliane Caffé herself uses the term “tragicomedy” to refer to the story of the Javé residents, told in a rich way that combines a true-to-life reality with situational mix-ups and characters that are very funny – at times hilarious.

Javé is a small town in impoverished rural northeast Brazil and is slated to be flooded by the dam that will “bring progress.” All of the houses will be wiped out “in benefit of the majority, but we never find out who that majority is,” comments one villager.

A local leader, Zaqueu, the town’s link to the rest of the world, comes up with the idea that a book about the Javé’s glorious past could lead to its designation as a historic site and therefore save the town from inundation.

To achieve this it would be enough to write down the stories that the town’s older people are known for telling, replete with colourful details.

But for a writer, the only choice is Antonio Biá, the only person considered capable of recording the stories because all of the rest of the villagers are illiterate.

Biá is persona non grata in the village because, to justify his job at the post office – useless in a town of illiterate people – he wrote and sent letters to residents of other towns, reporting the idiosyncrasies and poor habits of the residents of Javé.

They ultimately have to reinstate the “writer”, who was exiled to the town’s periphery and who describes himself as an “intellectuary”, and entrust him with recording the oral memory of the community.

The mission proves to be impossible, with neighbours’ contradictory versions about the same event, recalling for film aficionados “Rashomon”, by Japanese director Akira Kurosawa.

Each one tells the story about the founding of the town that is in his or her best interest.

Indalecio, the town’s founding father, is remembered by an alleged descendent as European and as a model of courage, while others say he was of African origin and a leader of Brazilian blacks. Or, his role was secondary, says one woman who claims that a female relative of hers was the town’s founder.

The clashing histories exhaust any motivation that Biá had to complete the project. He is more interested in benefiting personally form the situation or inventing his own “more literary” version of the stories.

His notebook is blank, with only a few doodles and scrawls he made while pretending to listen to the storytellers.

In the end, the town is flooded by the reservoir and Biá tries to justify his non-compliance in writing down the stories, responding to the villagers’ insults that Javé would have been inundated anyway because its residents are “semi-illiterate” and don’t mean anything to the rest of the world.

His view is a cruel summary of the rules of “progress”. But he cries for the disappearance of the town and decides to take seriously the business of recording his neighbours’ histories.

This is Caffé’s second feature film. It confirms her talent and is emblematic of the growing presence of women among the new generation of Brazilian filmmakers.

Her first premiered in 1998, “Kenoma”, which was seen as promising, but lacked the emotion that erupts in “Narradores de Javé”.

The lead actor, José Dumont, who plays Biá in a Chaplinesque way, is the soul of the film, a veritable “co-author”, says Caffé.

Many of the lines that get audiences to laugh the loudest are his own improvisations. For example, he describes a man who tries to insert dentures that are too big as “ninja sperm” and “a crocodile in heat”.

Dumont, who has won many awards for the 35 films in which he as acted, developed the character based on his childhood in a town similar to Javé, in the poor provinces of northeast Brazil.

Despite his successes, Dumont lives a modest life in Rio de Janeiro, typical of talented actors who remain famous but relatively poor because they lack the sex appeal and looks to land roles in Brazil’s renowned soap operas – the main source of income for the stars.

In addition to Dumont, the participation in the movie by the local residents where the film was shot, in rural Bahía state, also gives the audience someone to identify with.

The non-professional actors helped “Narradores de Javé” to sweep the film festival in Recife, another northeastern city, winning nine awards last year.

Caffé’s work is being shown only in Brazil’s “art film” theatres, which sharply limits its box office potential.