Marighella

Saw this at the Berlinale 2019, where it was part of the official Competition, for some reason marked "out of competition" hence no candidate for awards. Entertaining, despite the troubles I have with heroism as demonstrated here, implying ample risks for family, friends and accidental bystanders. Of course, such downsides of activism can all be deemed collateral damage, regrettable but necessary and unavoidable for The Cause (with capitals). When countering activists, The Powers that Be (TPtB) go to every imaginable length, often much further than we see here, to achieve their goal of fighting "terrorists", thereby disregarding the sacrafices and aftermath they cause on their turn. Escalation on both sides lurks around the corner, bearing logical and unavoidable consequences.

Having said that, the fights and the successive phases the struggle gets into, are visualized very well in this movie. There are enough recognizable protagonists to feel along with the activists. A point this movie makes very well is that we are invited to reciprobably feel along with those tasked to fight them. Both parties use every means to their disposal, whereby the anti-revolutionaries are just a bit nastier than the revolutionaries. The revolutionaries may have our sympathy given the overreach of power coming from the state, but to throw a bomb into a police station or a government building, as we saw happening, is a sure way to kill innocent people. So, the activists are only marginally less nasty than their enemies who incarcerate, torture and kill as standard tools-of-the-trade to achieve their goal.

History may have proven these activists correct in hindsight. We, fully aware of the outcome, can easily be convinced that the activists were indeed Good, and those fighting them were Bad (or at least Ugly). There are similar issues with the WW II period when judging people afterwards. More than one perfect illustration of this phenomenon can be seen in the movie Never Look Away / Werk Ohne Autor (2018), written and directed by Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck. It makes us inspect our current opinions: who is with-us or against-us or something in between. Initially, the genre label "Action" on IMDB was too limited, but it is deservedly replaced later by "Action Drama History", as the movie has more to show than just heroic activism.

All in all, thought provoking elements embedded in the story make this movie more interesting than reading the synopsis did assume beforehand. Each coin has two sides. Who is "good" is only clear in hindsight, which is easy for us but not that easy at the time. On the other hand, a superficial viewer can easily be lured into the trap of heroism from the side of the activists, and dismiss the reactionary forces as bad or even criminal. Such rapid conclusions do not show this movie the respect it deserves.

Marighella, despite Seu Jorge's brilliant interpretation, seems like a character suspended in the air; the Brazilian situation and the dictatorship that he was fighting, a fine background, almost unimportant. The acts of the guerrilla and his organization, the Ação Libertadora Nacional (ALN), seem self-motivated, as do those of repression. And so, the film about Marighella thus becomes an action thriller of heroes against villains, without historical support for the heroism of some and the villainy of others: they are on opposite sides, but their reasons are hardly touched. This "hang in the air" is also notable in the ideological field. There are several references to communism, it's true - but almost always from repression, in the form of insult, and almost never from the guerrillas, who only describe themselves as "communists" at the beginning of the film, when Marighella confronts a member of the " The party".

It is also notable that the guerrillas - who in real life suffered defeats, it is true - hardly have their victories explored in the film; they are constantly up against the wall, trying desperately to react and being crushed, almost as if martyrdom is for the guerrillas a choice, not a possibility. The exception is the takeover of Radio Nacional, but events like the kidnapping of Ambassador Charles Burke Elbrick, for which 15 political prisoners living under torture were released, are just another brushstroke of the background. This made the ALN seem like a small group, completely cut off from the masses (which do not exist in the film, except as an expectation, a dream of Marighella) and from the political disputes that, despite the dictatorship, unfold in the country. Anyone watching the film cannot imagine that, in 1968, the ALN had at least 50 militants in São Paulo (not to mention other states), that it carried out agitation and propaganda actions among the masses and that it still had some inherited bases of PCB (Brazilian communist party), especially between metallurgists and railways.

From a strictly artistic point of view, Marighella is a great movie. In addition to exquisite photography, interesting shots and an exciting soundtrack, there are sensitive details in the choice of actors - shepherd Henrique Vieira as Friar Fernando, for example, or Maria Marighella, the guerrilla's granddaughter, playing his first wife. However, none of this reverses the fact that the script leaves Marighella's story still untouched in the list of "stories that history will someday tell", just when, perhaps, we most needed it well told.

Review adapted from: Histórias que a História qualquer dia contará: Crítica de "Marighella", Revista Opera, by Pedro Marin.

Very good movie with great actors.

I'm still amazed to realize how users rate this movie based on their own left/right political beliefs. If only they would take it down a notch and realize this is a historical event being told as a movie and not an attack to their beliefs, they could start enjoying the production. Doesn't matter which paths you follow: history is history. Period. The fact this movie was released in 2019 and only now in 2021 we're getting the chance to finally watch it, should tell you a thing or two about how censoring still reigns around here.

It's a powerful and moving film. Heads up for Wagner Moura.

Wonderful movie with real content. A must see if you're interested in history and good cinema, not only theme park brain-washing entertainment.