Cinema brasileiro e o mito “Rio de Janeiro: a Cidade Maravilhosa”

Maria Helena Braga E Vaz Da Costa Costa

doi:10.4013/fem.2013.153.05

Abstract

This paper will discuss the representation of the “myth” of the marvelous city attributed to the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro by looking at the contemporary Brazilian film production and its creation of new paradigms for representing and understanding Brazilian cultural identity. It will also comment on the concept of production of space through the analysis of the cinematic representation of Rio de Janeiro in the film The Man of the Year ( O Homem do Ano , Jose Guilherme Fonseca, 2002). This film generally touches on many relevant matters related to the understanding of contemporary Brazilian urban life and cultural identity commenting on the concepts and discussion such as: the city of imagination; the city as a product of a certain cultural uneasiness in relation to current concerns about identity and its confusing relationship to time and space; the city as embodying the notion of an entire country imagery; and finally, the city combining two opposing poles: the city as a civilized and modern space and the city as a traditional and primitive space. Key words: myth, urban and cultural identity, cinematic city, Rio de Janeiro.

Highlights

In this paper I will examine the premise that films are able to evoke the becoming of a city, revelling it to be continually in transition according to the demands of time, but at the same time unveiling it as a site of accumulated collective recollection of a “myth”
The allusion is to a particular case, the cinematic Rio de Janeiro, and to a particular “myth”– the one that,for a long time,quotes and celebrates the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro as “the marvelous city”
The third part is a brief presentation of the Brazilian national cinema context within which the imagery of “the myth” of Rio as “the marvelous city” plays a role.in the last part of this paper, a discussion about the imagery of Rio de Janeiro constructed in the film The Man of the Year ( José Guilherme Fonseca, 2002) explores the film’s construction of this city and the ways in which its cinematic city relates to the myth of “the marvelous city”

Summary

Introduction

In this paper I will examine the premise that films are able to evoke the becoming of a city, revelling it to be continually in transition according to the demands of time, but at the same time unveiling it as a site of accumulated collective recollection of a “myth”. In the case of Rio de Janeiro, the city’s elements such as its architectural urban features and natural landscape as a whole have acquired a symbolic dimension.The earlier “old”and “traditional”image associated to the city is changed by the concrete modifications and changes that transformed its public spaces and and primordially by the “idea” about the place, what paved the way for the vast interplay put into practice between reality and representation giving life to “the myth” It is central for the understanding of cinematic Rio de Janeiro to accept that collective imagination and imagery,and the “myth”which defines them,have assumed a more authentic and truthful nature than the actual conditions of life in the city themselves. It is often an attempt to give some “order” to the real filtered through feelings, desires, anxieties, and social forces

The marvelous city and the Brazilian cinema

The Man of the Year in the marvelous city

Closing up