Screening /
“Macunaímam,” preceded by discussion with Steven Villereal and Audrey Young

Date: Friday, 30 January 2009, 8–10:30 pm
Location: Cabinet, 300 Nevins Street, Brooklyn (map and directions here)
FREE. No RSVP necessary
Organized by Steven Villereal and Audrey Young­

Joaquim Pedro de Andrade’s rollicking 1969 film Macunaíma is an adaptation of the hugely influential 1928 novel by Mario de Andrade (no relation), the picaresque tale of an allegorical Brazilian “hero with no character.” The eponymous hero (played in part by the famous vaudeville comic and singer Grande Otelo) morphs races, couples with goddesses, and chases after a mythic stone possessed by an evil giant (embodied as a São Paulo business magnate). A wild document of the “tropicalismo” movement, the film explicitly revisits the modernist writings of Oswald de Andrade (no relation!) who advocated a distinctly Brazilian “cultural cannibalism” that stews Brazil’s diverse contributing cultures together in one pot. A DVD of the newly restored film will be screened, with a contextual Powerpoint presentation beforehand by NYU Moving Image Archiving & Preservation students and fierce lusophiles Steven Villereal and Audrey Young. (110 minutes, Portuguese w. English subtitles.)