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The Criterion Channel Presents: Black Orpheus (1959)


I love how much Black Orpheus loves Rio. From the opening establishing shot (revealed with the explosion of a Greek sculpture) throughout the movie and up to its’ final moments, this is a piece that adores Rio de Janeiro and especially its’ black community. There are so many scenes set in the hills overlooking the favelas, Christ the Redeemer is visible in the backgrounds of many shots, the beauty of the city rendered in crisp, exciting colour for 1959 -all of it serves to highlight this place and its’ vivid wonders, attached directly to those of the myth it is retelling.
Black Orpheus was made by Marcel Camus, a French filmmaker, but it was produced by and in Brazil, utilizing many talents of that country that had rarely been seen in the rest of the world outside of exoticism. And to a degree Camus is guilty of this as well, his Rio carefully avoids some of the harsher slums and living conditions as well as any hints of racism. It is an idealized picture to be sure. But he gets away with this by completely centring black figures (the only white guy in the film is Camus himself as Orpheus’ boss), and by setting the film in a semi-fantastical context outside of time and reality. Rio is the only certainty.
It is a world in which the Orpheus myth exists and yet two people familiar with it named Orpheus (Breno Mello) and Eurydice (Marpessa Dawn) meet and fall in love anyway. She has arrived in Brazil on the run from someone trying to kill her -a personification of Death dressed as a skeleton in the spirit of the annual Carnival that all will take part in before movies’ end. It’s sweet and simple, except of course for Orpheus’ fiancé Mira (Lourdes de Oliveira), whom he doesn’t much connect with. As these figures, also including Eurydice’s cousin Serafina (Léa Garcia), move within their world and interact, the film walks the tightrope of reality and metaphor: so much seems to be grounded but then the characters might appear to be plucked out of myth. For instance it’s not clear how seriously we’re supposed to take Orpheus’ guitar playing as the thing that makes the sun rise, as he tells the local children. And later of course once the Orphic sequence as we know it comes about, there are these curious ways Camus plays with the underworld, the voice of Eurydice, the ultimate tragedy.
That ambiguity is right though, and this myth fits perfect in this new context. And also with these people, whose culture the film is most dedicated to highlighting. Black Orpheus celebrates the rituals, the style of black Brazilians -opening with a long samba sequence and touching down on the unique religions and identities that exist among this particular diaspora. Dance is an especially big deal, the Carnival is illustrated with elaborate routines and performances that depict with joy the spontaneity and colour of black Latin pride -this at a time when such a thing was impossible just a continent away. And Camus shoots it all with vibrant life and thrilling versatility in rich lighting and environments that make the world of the film seem so tangible. Other choices in the costuming for the Carnival for instance, really connects the modernity with the ancient, Eurydice in an eighteenth-century noble dress while Orpheus is decked in something much more personally cultural: a golden vest that emphasizes his muscles and symbolic deification.
Mello and Dawn both give very good performances, artful and expressive, fittingly larger than life. Camus makes the choice not to humanize them too much, yet at the same time keeping their pathos very real. They exist in relatable spaces too, for Orpheus especially in his everyday job and lifestyle. It contrasts their characterization, the mortal grandness of the stakes, yet effectively lends new meaning to the story. For his stark design, Death can be scary, and there’s great suspense to both the taking of Eurydice and Orpheus’ near-saving of her.
Black Orpheus has some fun with its concept -enjoyable touches like the guard dog named Cerberus. And it never feels like one culture’s story being transposed onto another. Rather like something akin to Throne of Blood, it makes the Orpheus story Brazilian -makes it black. For a famous tragedy, what sticks is all the joy. The Carnival and the celebrations, the love and ecstasy and dance. In the aftermath of the final tragedy, this movie goes out on the cutest note possible. Those two boys who Orpheus played for finding they too can make the sun rise through guitar playing -they and a little girl then dance along the slopes overlooking Rio -a beautiful end to a superb little movie.

Criterion Recommendation: Loving Vincent (2017)
Animation remains an extremely underrepresented form in the Criterion Collection -this is at least the third time I’ve recommended they induct an art film animated gem. Loving Vincent was painstakingly created over a period of six years, each frame hand-painted by over a hundred artists in the style of van Gogh to a kind of advanced rotoscope technique that is a marvel to behold. Obviously with each image, its’ own gorgeous work of art, this is one of the most glorious animated movies ever made, a treat to watch in its’ every facet. The story is poignant and gripping too though, as it follows the postman subject of one of Vincent’s paintings, travelling to Auvers-sur-Oise in the aftermath of the great artists’ death to find what happened. Is there a conspiracy? Was he murdered? It’s the journey of someone trying to make sense of depression and suicide, all along drawing Vincent as the complicated, distraught, brilliant artist that he was. It is the greatest van Gogh tribute that has yet been put to film, and its’ visual richness and breathtaking magic earns it that special spot among the most intrepid advancements of its’ form.

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