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Must See?
Most Definitely Yes!
This is one of the most powerful neo-realistic
films ever made.
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Pixote a lei do mais fraco directed by Hector Babenco, is one of those films whose subject matter has so escaped the darkness of the projection room as to make it impossible to comment on it merely in terms of film making. Pixote's story continued, a painful and foretold tragedy, for seven years, until its dreadful epilogue.

The launch of Pixote (the word means "wee-one") in 1980 hit the public like a mule's kick by addressing the shocking reality— couched in scenes of raw beauty—of one of Brazil's most serious social problems, that of abandoned children, of which there are several million in the country. The international recognition of Pixote (voted the third best foreign film of the 1980s by the magazine American Film) confirmed that Hector Babenco had conceived an outstanding film about violated youth and the painful loss of innocence, ranked with Vittorio de Sica's 'Ladri di biciclette' and Luis Bunuel's 'Los Olvidados'.

The underprivileged communities living on the outskirts of São Paulo provided the cast for the film: dozens of poor and ostracized youngsters, none of whom had ever acted before. Among them was Fernando Ramos da Silva, who lived with eight brothers and his widowed mother in a São Paulo shanty town.

The performance he gets out of amateur Fernando Ramos da Silva is astonishing. Not since Jean-Pierre Léaud's performance in The 400 Blows (1959) had a child actor delivered a performance so filled with sadness and pathos. Da Silva's large eyes, set off by his round baby face, speak of someone who has seen too much too soon. Pixote is a raw, heart-wrenching experience that will burn into the viewer's mind for a long time to come.Slightly built, shy and, as Babenco put it, "with an old man's face" Fernando was 11 years old when filming began on Pixote. His poignant acting is a mixture of naiveté and fear, his expressions bore the cares of the world. His face became a symbol for what he was and what he represented: the drama of the abandoned child. The film was "universal in its grief," according to the author of the book on which it was based.

Following the trajectory of Pixote—first in a police station, then in a reformatory, and finally on the streets of Rio and São Paulo—the film plunges deep into the world of abandoned Brazilian youth. Pixote witnesses and is a product of the three-fold collapse which is the root cause of the tragedy of street children: the breakdowns of the family unit, the social services and the institutions. The children and adolescents have on their side one paradoxical guarantee: that of exemption from the punitive aspects of the law until they reach official adulthood at the age of 18. This impunity also makes them ideal as apprentice criminals, especially under the tutelage of fully blown adult drug runners.

The sordid environment of the reformatory is the back drop for the initial part of the film; to the insensitive attitude of those in authority is added the impotence of those who wish to help (teachers and psychologists). Only the very strong can survive the situation, where solidarity and sadism set the tone.

Hector Babenco did not recoil at revealing the atrocities of the environment—sexual abuse, police violence, early contact with drugs. However, he still manages, despite the ugliness and degradation, to produce scenes of great poetry. An example is the scene where Pixote tries to follow a football match and darts and pokes his head around the body of the woman who is cutting his hair. Later, in the classroom, he laboriously writes "the earth is round like an orange," his face is viewed close-up while he mutters the words he is writing.

The claustrophobic atmosphere of the reformatory, accentuated by cold, blue lighting, gives way to the colours of the streets of São Paulo and Rio. After fleeing the reformatory, Pixote, the youngest boy, forms a little gang with three friends, one of whom is a transvestite, Lilica (played by the excellent Jorge Julião). Having made contact with a cocaine dealer, the little gang departs for Rio to sell the drugs; increasing violence culminates in Pixote committing his first murder. His encounter with the prostitute Sueli (Marilia Pera in an outstanding performance) figures among the most significant scene in any or all Brazilian films: having killed his customer and his friend, Pixote suckles at the breast of the prostitute, who had aborted a few days previously, in a poignant allusion to the Pietá. The conclusion of the scene probes the heavy ambiguity of the prostitute in relation to motherhood.

Notwithstanding the Cinema Novo's awareness of social concerns, Hector Babenco opted for a straightforward narrative in Pixote, in which the camera restricts itself to depicting scenes and situations and, above all, their effect on the characters. The pace is sustained by the careers of the boys themselves and the tragedy stamped on the faces of these youthful crooks; tension is provided by the awfulness of some of the scenes and by the hopelessness of the children's lot. Babenco was remorselessly realistic in his portrayal, while remaining sympathetic in his search for lost innocence. Not wishing to produce a documentary about street children, nor attempting to identify social causes for the problem, Babenco stated that he "used the reality as a trampoline in trying to find the human being inside every juvenile offender."

Early in the film, Babenco shows hundreds of "Pixotes," slowly homing in on the group whose progress he would follow, and gradually narrowing his sights on Pixote. At the end of the film, Pixote, who carries the weight of three murders on his childish shoulders, walks alone down the railway track, a revolver his sole companion.

Fernando Ramos da Silva tried to pursue a career as an actor, following the success of Pixote, but his stardom was short-lived. Once again on the road to nowhere, with total lack of prospects, he ran into trouble with the authorities, and was shot dead by the police in 1987, at the age of 19. He fulfilled the destiny of the Pixote of the film; but, more tragically, that of the many Pixotes in true life, also. Fernando Ramos da Silva became Pixote—on screen and in true life—forever.
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Fernando Ramos da Silva
1968 -1987





FILM INFORMATION: 'Pixote A Lei do Mais Fraco'

Web: Additional Cast, Details and Bios at IMDb
Director: Hector Babenco
Writers: José Louzeiro (book) & Hector Babenco (writer)
Cast: Full Cast, Crew & Credits
Genre: Action | Crime | Drama
Awards: Nominated for Golden Globe plus 7 Wins
Runtime: 128 minutes
Spoken Language: (BR) Portuguese
Subtitles: English
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FILM CLIP: 'Pixote A Lei do Mais Fraco'



DOWNLOAD & EXTRACT FILM FILES: 'Pixote A Lei do Mais Fraco'

" . .once upon a time
there was a son who
wanted to have a father
who wanted to have a son . ."

For a 13-year-old boy like Filipe, (played by José Afonso Pimentel) the prospect of a summer vacation in the Azores with his father (played by João Lagarto) is like a dream come true. It's a time for them to become re-acquainted and it's also a time for his first girlfriend and annoying questions to his father about love and sex.

'But dreams are sometimes just a way to avoid facing reality...'

In the first hour of the film, we see 13 year old Filipe on holiday in the Azores, with just his father. The man is trying to get to know the boy, who harbors a severe grudge for the nature of their non-relationship. Eventually, it becomes clear that the man is terminally ill.

Suddenly, it becomes evident that the whole story to this point is a fabrication of the boys imagination. In school he claims in an essay that his lawyer father is dead, but we then see the all the same actors in Lisbon who were the characters in Filipe's Azores odyssey, all living rather meaningless and routine lives. Filipe's estrangement from his father is obviously permanent and the boy blames his mother for not having had an abortion which would have spared him from his loneliness and misery. This is a poignant and touching film from Portuguese director Luís Filipe Rocha and as noted in the above photo, José Afonso Pimentel (Filipe) has become quite the stunning young man.

Film Information: 'Adeus, pai' (Good-bye Father)

Web: Cast, Bios and Additional Details at IMDb
Director: Luís Filipe Rocha
Writer: Luís Filipe Rocha
Cast, Crew & Credits: Full Cast, Crew & Credits
Genre: Drama
Runtime: 85 min
Spoken Language: Portuguese
Subtitled in: English

Film Preview Clip: 'Adeus, pai' (Good-bye Father)




Film File Download: 'Adeus, pai' (Good-bye Father)