Palme d'Or and Oscar's BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM (although it should have been rewarded to Brazil instead of France) double-honour is a tremendous wow factor to lure in cinephiles, but sometimes the prestige backfires, the film may introduce Samba and Boss Nova to the world, but how can it overshadows an awkward truth, it won over 400 BLOWS (1959, 9/10) in the Cannes competition, a mania of over-exploited exoticism may be the answer.
Marcel Camus' second film, it restyles the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice during the Carnival ruckus in Rio de Janeiro, the black Orpheus (Mello) is a boisterous trolley conductor who is just engaged to an even more boisterous girl Mira (de Oliveria), at the same day, he meets his Eurydice (Dawn), a young girl flees from her home to her cousin Serafina (Garcia) because Death (De Silva) is stalking her. While Serafina and Orpheus are next-door neighbours on a hill overlooking the city, naturally the serendipity pulls them together after lavishly sambaing with the folk, which consequently interrupted by a macabre encounter with the flamboyant Death sporting a clownish gymnastic suit.
Orpheus is a musician, he has the power to bring sunrise every morning by crooning with his guitar, he and Eurydice copulate during the very first night out of irresistible passion, and the next day is the Carnival, but the fierily jealous Mira cannot bear the betrayal meanwhile Death is also on his track to his prey. A tragedy occurs in the heat of the Carnival, and Orpheus is in complete despair to bring Eurydice back, but he cannot yield to the "don't look back" warning in a ritual ceremony, thus his lost is permanent, and the myth comes to a climax in a deadly fall. But mercifully, the finale heralds an auspicious future, a new Orpheus is born out of schmaltzy puppy love, a false hope is better than a bizarre dismay out of a sloppy production.
The acting is inadequate, playing-house, sometimes unbearably hammy (de Oliveria and Garcia are two examples of overdoing their characters with opposite reactions, irksome and hilarious), the rumbustious dancing and bandwagon scenes are affecting enough to involuntarily shake your posterior but enough is enough, we are not watching a documentary about local customs and manners of Carnival or Brazil. The detachment between the narrative and lush surroundings is markedly protruded, but the appreciable saving grace is Camus contrives to frame awe- inspiring panorama shots and overhead takes, with the poverty-stricken people roister in their festival, which showcases their aboriginal glee is authentic (at least mostly). The more grim and satanic facet of the ancient Greek legend is deadened by the unremitting revelry and polychromatism, if only Camus could pander to the obsession of the dark side of the myth a bit more, say, the grisly corridor in the missing person division or the fluorescent terminus where Eurydice absurdly being electrocuted, the film would be more palatable both in visual style and in emotive rhythm.
Marcel Camus' second film, it restyles the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice during the Carnival ruckus in Rio de Janeiro, the black Orpheus (Mello) is a boisterous trolley conductor who is just engaged to an even more boisterous girl Mira (de Oliveria), at the same day, he meets his Eurydice (Dawn), a young girl flees from her home to her cousin Serafina (Garcia) because Death (De Silva) is stalking her. While Serafina and Orpheus are next-door neighbours on a hill overlooking the city, naturally the serendipity pulls them together after lavishly sambaing with the folk, which consequently interrupted by a macabre encounter with the flamboyant Death sporting a clownish gymnastic suit.
Orpheus is a musician, he has the power to bring sunrise every morning by crooning with his guitar, he and Eurydice copulate during the very first night out of irresistible passion, and the next day is the Carnival, but the fierily jealous Mira cannot bear the betrayal meanwhile Death is also on his track to his prey. A tragedy occurs in the heat of the Carnival, and Orpheus is in complete despair to bring Eurydice back, but he cannot yield to the "don't look back" warning in a ritual ceremony, thus his lost is permanent, and the myth comes to a climax in a deadly fall. But mercifully, the finale heralds an auspicious future, a new Orpheus is born out of schmaltzy puppy love, a false hope is better than a bizarre dismay out of a sloppy production.
The acting is inadequate, playing-house, sometimes unbearably hammy (de Oliveria and Garcia are two examples of overdoing their characters with opposite reactions, irksome and hilarious), the rumbustious dancing and bandwagon scenes are affecting enough to involuntarily shake your posterior but enough is enough, we are not watching a documentary about local customs and manners of Carnival or Brazil. The detachment between the narrative and lush surroundings is markedly protruded, but the appreciable saving grace is Camus contrives to frame awe- inspiring panorama shots and overhead takes, with the poverty-stricken people roister in their festival, which showcases their aboriginal glee is authentic (at least mostly). The more grim and satanic facet of the ancient Greek legend is deadened by the unremitting revelry and polychromatism, if only Camus could pander to the obsession of the dark side of the myth a bit more, say, the grisly corridor in the missing person division or the fluorescent terminus where Eurydice absurdly being electrocuted, the film would be more palatable both in visual style and in emotive rhythm.