Barren Lives (1963)
- General info
- Available formats
- Synopsis:
Filmed with a strong sense of compassion for the impoverished and an underlying hatred for the injustice which forces them into the lives they must live, this is one of the first works from Brazil's Cinema Novo. A poor Brazilian family struggle to earn a living when they take a job overseeing the livestock of a wealthy rancher. They move into an abandoned house, and their fortunes begin to take an upward turn. The father is duped into a card game with a crooked local policeman. The ranch hand protests, and a fight ensues that results in his beating by the cop. Despite being the victim of injustice, the man believes there should be some semblance of law and order and makes no protest about the incident. A severe drought has the man moving on from the ranch with his family to earn their living elsewhere. - Actors:
- Átila Iório, Maria Ribeiro, Orlando Macedo, Joffre Soares, Gilvan Lima, Genivaldo Lima, Orlando Chagas, Ignacio Costa, Nabor Costa, Oscar de Souza, José Leite, Vanuterio Maia, Manuel Ordonio, Maria Rosa, Antonio Soarez
- Directors:
- Nelson Pereira dos Santos
- Writers:
- Nelson Pereira dos Santos, Graciliano Ramos
- Aka:
- Vidas Secas
- Genres:
- Classics, Drama
- Countries:
- Brazil
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Reviews (1) of Barren Lives
The Title Wasn't Mucking About - Barren Lives review by griggs
Respect and enjoyment don’t always travel together, and Vidas Secas puts that gap on screen for roughly 100 minutes. The political anger is baked into every cracked frame, the refusal to sentimentalise poverty is admirable, and the landscape photography communicates a life reduced to pure survival — dust, silence, blank horizons doing the work dialogue refuses to carry.
But austerity can tip from powerful into punishing, and for me it tipped. The characters felt trapped at a distance from me as well as from society — figures in a thesis about injustice rather than people I could grip onto. The episodic structure diagnoses brilliantly but rarely builds. And the dog moved me more than most of the human suffering. Which probably says something about me, or the film, or both.
Dry land. Dry lives. Dry viewing experience. The title wasn’t mucking about.