Amarelo Manga

Cláudio Assis won several awards at festivals for his feature debut, "Amarelo Manga" aka "Mango Yellow". His mosaic about some very troubled lives starts intriguing, and the talented, versatile cast (Matheus Nachtergaele, Chico Diaz, Dira Paes, Jonas Bloch and Leona Cavalli) keeps our attention till the end. However, Assis fails on the same aspects as other pretense "provocateurs", such as Sérgio Bianchi ("Chronically Unfeasible") and Larry Clark ("Kids" seemed to have some honesty, but "Ken Park" is one of the most unnecessary flicks ever made): excessive nudity (I actually think there should be MORE nudity in films, since nudity should be treated as natural by everybody; but this movie is a great example of how nudity should not be presented), too much visual and verbal masturbation for pure shock factor. I'm far from being a prude and that's why I admire directors like Todd Solondz, Lars von Trier, Pedro Almodóvar and Gregg Araki, just to name a few, who know how to provoke without being shallow, unlike Cláudio.

People like Tata Amaral, Jorge Furtado, Beto Brant (and let's not even mention the internationally acclaimed Hector Babenco, Walter Salles and Fernando Meirelles), have made thought-provoking, intelligent films, without being gratuitous or shallow. They are the real provocateurs in Brazilian cinema, something that Assis and Sérgio Bianchi haven't proved to be, yet. There's more to a provocateur than "sex and stomach": wit is essential to the mixture, Mr. Assis. 3/10.

This was a thoroughly disgusting and pointless film and I am not sure how folks could watch and praise it. The movie is filled with disgusting and wretchedness. Were these sentiments strong enough to hopefully keep you from seeing this film---I sure hope so! My thorough disgust for the film isn't because it shows the lowest elements of Brazilian society-- after all, I was quick to praise films like CITY OF GOD and CENTRAL STATION--and these films were violent and scary. However, their portrayals of the violence and cheapness of life in the lowest social strata were meant to be eye-opening and document the horrors--not provide a voyeuristic chamber of horrors meant only to turn our stomachs. I won't even begin to describe all the viscerally vile images from MANGO YELLOW--partly because they make me ill just thinking about it and partly because I could only take the movie to a certain point, then I made myself get up and turn it off! It truly seems to try to alienate much of its audience.

If you want a similar experience, go to a slaughterhouse (it's already in the film) or stare at feces (it's also in the film and is apparently eaten by one of the scum in the film). Yuck.

I do not recommend this film and as another reviewer has stated, it is not a good representation of the country or even the city of Recife, Brazil. It is needlessly depressing. If you can take the movie as a criticism of life itself, it could have more meaning. The stereotypes and innuendos depicted about Brazilian life are not characteristic of the subject. The spiritual journey of the main character is depicted as a positive one, but it suggests that the only escape available for her is to have a solitary life.

The experience was hampered by the quality of the pirated work, with low quality audio and image, but enough to taste a beautiful work, the Brazilianness and its ills, sensual nudity, well-developed script, a simple story, almost caricatured, but broken, representative and cotiana, highlighting the performances, big names in cinema, delivering extraordinary staging, it couldn't be different from that... Beautiful movie from Cinema de Retake... THE COVER, vagina, it took me a while to realize.

I went to see this film based on the favourable comments from other Imdb users but I hated it. I am a foreigner living in Brazil and I can tell you that if I saw Brazil the way the director does, I would be on the next plane out of here. I thought the film was insulting, showing the misery in the most degrading and despising way. I am not denying of course that this misery exists but I don't think that the lower class is as repugnant as the film wants to portray it. Religious beliefs, which probably helps a lot of poor people cope with a harsh reality, is shown as a superficial veneer on top of some badly repressed bestiality. In the middle of a film which portrays all its characters as a bunch of near animals, there is a shot where a man is reading a book by Nietzsche. Was this irony? A "clin d'oeil" of the director to his middle class audience? I didn't know what to make of this.

There have been some really good brazilian films lately (eu,tu,eles, central do Brasil,...) but this is not one of them. In fact it seems like a return to the really crap 70s brazilian films where compulsive swearing, unrealistic emotional intensity from beginning to end and any excuse to show a woman's pubic hair were the main ingredients.