The Gendered Revolutionary Body: Memory and Resistance in "Torre das Donzelas"

Abstract

In her 2018 documentary Torre das Donzelas (Maidens’ Tower), Susanna Lira explores the experiences of women who were political prisoners during the dictatorship via interviews and a spatial recreation of the women’s cellblock of the Tiradentes prison, known as the Torre das Donzelas. Lira creatively employs set design and sound as discursive elements that complement the women’s testimony and broaden its portrayal of memory and haunting; moreover, as this article argues, the older women (senhoras) who embody past and present political resistance enable the film to contest conventional expectations regarding guerrillas, political prisoners, and the romantic, masculine notion of revolution.