Filmes de Interés Gay

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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'

'A Gripping, Tragic Tale
of Love, Sex and
Obsession that Showcases
the Anatomy of Desire
and Longing'

The human longings that stir deep within us are the focus of "Antonio's Secret' From the very beginning of the film the viewer is made privy to the thoughts of Antonio as he makes his narrative against a musical background of guitar strums and an acoustic voice. With this kind of introduction, you know at once that you are in for an intimate ride.

Antonio's Secret is about a young boy who grows up without his father. It narrates how he and his mother are forced to get by and the bond they share through the years of nurturing and companionship. But most of all, it is about how a boy grows up knowing he is different, how he ponders on the meaning of his desires, how he represses them and how he yearns to tell someone but fears the consequences of rejection.

Newcomer Kenji Garcia gives a very real and believable portrayal of the confused young man named Antonio. We are shown Antonio's dilemma as he grows up in a world where there are no role models to emulate. He is left to discover it on his own with uncertainty and fear plaguing him all the way. This is clearly seen in one of the scenes in the movie where he watches his childhood friend sleep. It is in a scene like this that "Antonio's Secret' shows the anatomy of longing. Kenji successfully shows how a boy's desire to express his sexuality leads him to appreciate his friends' body from afar before he is spurred to come closer and caress his friend. Viewers are held on the edge of their seats in tension and fear for Antonio and what he is about to discover. The result is a childhood experiment that forever changes the relationship between two friends.


Things take a more climactic turn with the arrival of Antonio's uncle, Jonbert (played by Josh Ivan Morales). It can be said that no better choice can be made for this role than Josh Ivan. His sexuality is powerful and bleeds from the screen to the audience. Viewers easily feel the powerful attraction of the boyish Antonio for his uncle. His sideway glances; for example, at a dinner table had no dialogue but carried a depth of desire. Both Kenji and Josh Ivan's execution of their roles complement each other to form an innocent but obsessive and highly charged relationship. Jonbert's encounters with Antonio in the course of the film and Josh Ivan's performance as the hedonistic uncle may even fulfill some some viewers fantasies as well.


Also in the movie is Jiro Manio who plays Mike, Antonio's curious best friend. Jiro offers a comedic side to this otherwise serious film. His punchy lines a funny and welcome break from the intense soliloquies of Antonio or the harsh realities of a mother raising her kid alone. Jiro successfully depicts the innocence of his age faced with gender stereotypes and social realities.

But the true scene-stealer of the movie is Shamaine Buencamino who plays Antonio's mother. Her acting, most particularly in the last part of the movie, was brilliant. There was none of the over-the-top shouting and crazed gestures Filipino movies are known for. Instead, Sharmaine's acting was restrained requiring no words but only her facial expression and stance to relay her emotions. Her scene in front of a mirror peeling away the wrapped towel around her body evokes of lost years and a need to be touched while the traumatic and scarring events in the movie's tragic ending show a woman with all sanity lost, showered only by a son's love. It is truly a performance that brings to mind actress Meryl Streep in the movie 'The Bridges of Madison County'. ~ Danio Caw PEP .................(above) Antonio

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(left) Antonio and his best friend Nathan

. . at times humorous,
at times nostalgic,
and at times tragic . .

The Times of Harvey Milk, directed by Rob Epstein, documents the political career of Harvey Milk who was San Francisco's first openly gay supervisor.The film, at times humorous, at times nostalgic, and at times tragic, documents the rise of Milk from a neighborhood activist to becoming a symbol of gay political achievement, through to his assassination at San Francisco's city hall.

The film was produced after Milk's death using archival footage, so that Milk is credited as the lead (posthumously).

Other politicians including San Francisco mayor George Moscone (who was assassinated with Milk), and Moscone's successor and now United States Senator Dianne Feinstein appear in archival footage. The movie opens with a tearful Feinstein delivering her announcement to the media that Moscone and Milk had been assassinated by Dan White.

Also featured in the film is then-schoolteacher Tom Ammiano who has been a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors since 1994. The film was narrated by Harvey Fierstein.

Film Information: 'The Times of Harvey Milk'

Web: Cast, Bios and Additional Details at IMDb
Director: Rob Epstein
Writers: Judith Coburn (narration) Carter Wilson (narration)
Credits: Full Cast, Crew & Credits
Genre: Documentary | Biography
Awards: Won Oscar. Another 7 wins & 1 nomination
Run Time: 90min
Spoken Language: English

Film Files: 'The Times of Harvey Milk'

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Harvey Milk's Last Words (1979)



Download Extra: Candlelight Vigil
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. . banned from
American screens
simply because it
used the word
homosexual . .

Recent critics find "Victim" timid in its treatment of homosexuality, but viewed in the context of Great Britain in 1961, it's a film of courage. How much courage can be gauged by the fact that it was originally banned from American screens simply because it used the word "homosexual." To be gay was a crime in the United States and the U.K., and the movie used the devices of film noir and thriller to make its argument, labeling laws against homosexuality "the blackmailer's charter." Indeed, 90 percent of all British blackmail cases had homosexuals as victims.

The defense of homosexuality was not a popular topic at the box office when the film was made, and director Basil Dearden tried to broaden the film's appeal by making it into a thriller and a police procedural. There is no sex on (or anywhere near) the screen, and while the hero is homosexual by nature, there is doubt that he has ever experienced gay sex. The plot hinges on anonymous blackmailers who collect regular payments from wealthy and famous gays, and on the decision of a prominent barrister to stand up to them.

This man is Melville Farr, who at the young age of 40 has just been offered the opportunity to become a Queen's Counselor. He will lose that appointment, his career and his marriage if he's identified in the press as gay, and yet he decides that someone must stand up to the blackmailers to demonstrate the injustice of the law. As he tracks the blackmailers through a network of their victims, the movie follows him through the London of the time -- its courts of law, police stations, pubs, clubs, barbershops, used bookstores, cafes, drawing rooms, car dealerships -- showing how ordinary life is affected in countless ways by the fact that many of its citizens must keep their natures a secret.

Farr was played by Dirk Bogarde, as a smooth, skilled barrister who projects a surface of strength and calm. He only raises his voice two or three times in the movie, but we sense an undercurrent of anger: He finds it wrong that homosexuality is punished, wrong that gays cannot go to the police to complain of blackmail, wrong that hypocrisy flourishes. There is a moment in the movie when he unexpectedly hits someone who has just insulted him, and it comes as a revelation: Beneath his silky persona is a wound, a resentment, and a fierce determination to act at last on his convictions.

The opening sequences of the film involve him only slightly, as we follow a young man named Jack Barrett (Peter McEnery), on the run from the police. We learn fairly soon that he is gay, but only gradually do we understand he is wanted for embezzlement. Broke, desperate for the money to get out of London, he calls Farr, is rebuffed, and is also turned away by a book dealer (Norman Bird), a car dealer and others. His desperation is closely observed in a pub where many of the characters hang out, including an odd couple: a ratlike little man and his heftier companion, who is blind but hears all the gossip.

Barrett is arrested, and found with a scrapbook of clippings about Farr. To the almost unconvincingly wise and civilized Detective Inspector Harris (John Barrie), it's an open-and-shut case: Barrett has no money, lived simply, had stolen thousands from his employer, seemed gay, and therefore was a blackmail victim.

He calls in Farr, who offers no help, but when Harris tells him that the young man has hanged himself in his cell, Farr is deeply shaken. He has good reason: He loved Barrett.

His wife Laura (Sylvia Syms) immediately reads his mood and eventually learns of his friendship with Barrett. She knew when they married that he'd had a youthful infatuation with a fellow Cambridge student, but that it was "behind him." He never had sex with Barrett, he tells her, and stopped seeing the young man when he sensed their feelings were growing too strong -- but for her it's as much of a betrayal as physical contact, because he shows that what he felt for Barrett was different, more powerful, than what he feels for her. ~ Roger Ebert-23 May 2004