Cinema novo, representação social e identidade brasileira nos filmes Rio, 40 graus (1955) e Vidas Secas (1963)

Abstract

The present research intends to investigate the relationship between cinemanovista cinematographic production and Brazilian identity through the analysis of the social types and spaces highlighted in two films belonging to the movement: Rio, 40 Graus (1955) and Vidas Secas (1963), both of which are achievements by São Paulo filmmaker Nelson Pereira dos Santos. The work seeks to understand the cultural dichotomy that opposes two regions: Southeast and Northeast, urbanized and rural, in search for a definition of the national culture of a time, through cinematographic analysis (semiotics) and social representation. It also questions how the films translate – in part – these spaces, allowing the recognition of a cultural identity. We focus on two historical moments of Cinema Novo, which are exactly the years of 1955, when we have the release of the feature film Rio, 40 Graus, and 1963, which was the date of the release of Vidas Secas. The theoretical matrices selected for this work are located in the fields of analysis of the New History, and, above all, in the methods that propose a study of the film as a historical document of its time (FERRO, 1971), still seeking to emphasize, through the social representation, the direct relationship that Cinema Novo carries along with the Brazilian identity (Roger Chartier, 1988; Jacques Le Goff, 1990), thus developing a reflection on Brazilian cinema and the cinematographic aesthetic development of the 1950s/1960s (Alex Viany , 1959; Paulo Emílio Gomes, 1986; Jean-Claude Bernardet, 1977; Ismail Xavier, 1993). About the concept of identity and cultural history, we are guided by the theories of David Harvey (1979), Stuart Hall (1992) and Sandra Jatahy Pesavento (2003). The scenarios explored in the research are the favela in the midst of the metropolis in Rio de Janeiro, and the Northeastern Caatinga, located in the interior of Alagoas, contrasting physical spaces that served as a scenario for the development of the productions. We start from the theoretical support existing in the studies on cinema in Christian Metz (1977) and Marcel Martin (2005), which allow us to access the theoretical conceptualization of film; the interpretation of urban and rural space in Raymond Williams (1989), Raquel Ronilk (1995), Milton Santos (1997), Henri Lefebvre (2006) and Anne Cauquelin (2007). Through our work, it will be possible to determine the process of maturation of Brazilian audiovisual production since its beginnings, and how the cinemanova aesthetic evolution took place, which redesigned limits and expressive signs that were confused with the Brazilian culture of the late 1950s and the beginning of the 1960s, demonstrating the Brazilian people and its Brazilianness in different contexts.