Paraíso
Oh, the humanity. It oozes from the screen.
Elderly people spontaneously gather at a public park to sing, taking away bad vibes and even illness. The park is smack in the middle of Rio de Janeiro, in the old presidential palace. These events (and some of the people) are yet another victim of the COVID19 pandemic.
This is “classified” as a documentary, but as the director mentions, while there’s an element of construction in most scenes, they really project an hyper-reality, a esoteric of purer truth that cannot be simply seen just by direct filming.
The title is somewhat ironic. The microcosm presented on the film is twice constructed. Externally, it’s right in the middle of one of the most violent places in the world (including literal warzones), it is presented as an idyll of union between whites and blacks, rich and poor, old and ancient; an island of concord in a country of strife. Internally, there are bitter rivalries between singers, people nodding off during the songs, jealousy over who appears on the film.
The screening I attended had live director commentary, and a bunch of forlorn Brazilians in the audience, pining for better times and emotional thanks to the director. 😢😭
This is my place for ramblings about sequences of images that exploit the human visual limitation know as persistence of vision.