lauloi

Central do Brasil has everything. You come expecting a story of a woman who takes care of a child in a harsh social milieu. You sit in disbelief as this woman shows herself to be a heartless opportunist, and as your expectations are being confounded, you begin to realize how this villainess came to be such a person. The boy she begins to help is also no innocent movie cherub, he has an endearing slyness and a will to survive despite the horrible tragedy he has experienced.

Their road trip is an odyssey from bad to worse, and you begin to sympathize. The characters they meet and the landscape they traverse give us in the north a flavor of Brazil which I cannot confirm as being authentic. But they seem as complex and beautiful and full of contradiction as the Brazilian music that I love. And the final destination for the boy (you're on the edge of your seat hoping things will turn out right) is not a happily-ever-after, but seems to indicate a new direction for the character.

If I sound overly sentimental (I'm sure I do) it's because very few films have moved me like this one. I watched it through three times and cried at the scene of Dora on the bus every time. The use of religious imagery, from the modern evangelicalism of the truck driver to the more unfamiliar scenes with the pictures of the saints (incredible camerawork here) added dimensions of complexity in a medium where Christianity is often treated either in a saccharine fashion or with heavyhanded disdain. See Central Station.

I was fascinated by this self-contradictory, sometimes maddening film. I had only seen a snippet of it before, the brilliant song parody of a right-wing folksinger singing about welfare recipients who "complain and complain and complain and complain and complaaaaain!" I was impressed by the quality of this ditty and rented the movie.

Although billed as a comedy, I found this one to be a generally oil-and-water mixture of paranoid leftist diatribe and political comedy. Everytime a stereotypical "Republican" character elicited the response in my brain "nobody acts like THAT" I remembered, "oh yes, it's a comedy". Although I laughed less and my heart beat faster as the movie progressed...

I guess what disturbed me about this picture is it's off-kilter perspective. The viewer realizes that this slimy Machiavellian manipulator needs to be opposed. But the opposition seems to be almost equally unsympathetic. The screaming, cursing, holier-than-thou Saturday night live cast. The urbane liberal running against Bob who maintains that the CIA and National Security Council run the country. (Yeah, right...they can't even figure out that people can fly planes into buildings). The only rational perspective comes from the British documentary reporter, who views our political system with dry distaste. Was Tim Robbins making the statement that all Americans are crazy, including American filmmakers, and that only Europeans can be rational? If so, I strongly disagree (see Exhibits WWI and II)

The other disappointment for me was the downward spiral of song quality as the movie progresses. "Drugs stink"? Songs like this wouldn't bring even the zombified audiences the movie postulates into a frenzy.

Despite its flaws, however, I found Bob Roberts well worth watching for its star performances (Tim was great), its innovative camera work, and its emotional impact. I'd give it an 8.

I am a big fan of this film and may not be able to make a coherent case for it, especially after reading some of the lukewarm comments some of the viewers offer. I agree that some of the themes could have been developed better, and think that the ending smacks of a "Planet of the Apes" solution to a mystery, yet this film is superb for its relentless atmosphere of otherworldly possibility.

Perhaps I associate this film with the strangeness of the 1970's, when Pyramid Power, UFO cults, and interest in occult phenomena occupied much of popular culture. Weir plays on the apocalyptic feelings of many in that decade with his shots of mud falling from the skies and other phenomena. One of my all time favorite scenes is when Charlie the shaman visits the urbane upper-middle class household of Richard Chamberlain et al. and asks to see the family photo album. I still get chills up my spine thinking of that one.

An element that I enjoyed is the counter-intuitive idea that "there are no tribal aborigines" living in Australian cities...they are all assimilated into the European worldview. This opinion, asserted by the most prominent aborigine in the movie, is subverted bit by bit until the very structure of European logic (as represented by the lawyer Chamberlain) is completely undermined by the end of the movie. Another amazing touch is the juxtaposition of the aboriginal sacred cave complex and what the Europeans are using it for, and Chamberlains descent into all that darkness.

Don't try viewing this one on a commercial channel, it will make very little sense broken up in pieces. Rent it, suspend disbelief a little, and enjoy.