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Diálogos com Pessoa

Course on Brazilian Cinema

Getulio Vargas and the man who killed him

by Kelsey Cunningham 

On December 3rd, the Department of Spanish & Portuguese will present a screening of the film Getúlio at the Media Commons Theatre at Robarts Library. On the same theme and also available in the library’s collection of Portuguese language works is the novel O Homen que Matou Getúlio Vargas as well as it’s translation into English, Twelve Fingers: biography of an anarchist.

Diametrically opposite in every way, the film Getúlio directed by Joao Jardim and the novel O Homem queMatou Getúlio Vargas by Jô Soares recount the fate of the man who governed as dictator from 1930-45 and as democratically elected president from 1951-54. If these works converge on the suicide of the president, the tone and plot could not be any more different between these two works until that fatal end scene at the end of each work.

However, the starkest difference between these works is the point of view from which the story is told. In Getúlio,we see a humanized portrait of the dictator who couldn’t tie his shoes and who loved his daughter Alzira with a moving tenderness. Jardim attempts to plunge the viewer into verisimilitude to the point of choosing actors based on resemblances that seem to bring real historic photographs to life.  The book by Soares, however, is told from the perspective of a fictitious would-be assassin. Vargas appears as a minor character who represents a composite of the paradigms which the bumbling twelve-fingered Dimo endeavours to tear down.

Despite the fact that his political career spanned decades, Jardim’s film intimately zeros in on the chaos of the presidential palace and the psychology of the president during his final days. The Man who Killed Getúlio Vargas, on the other hand, spans the entire life of protagonist Dmitri Borja and his journeys as frustrated political assassin across the globe from his failed attempt targeting Franz Ferdinand to 24 August, 1954.

The dramatic tone of the film highlights the President Vargas’ resolve to not let the media-fueled coup d’état take him down alive. The film emphasizes the dictator’s innocence within the eye of a storm of his government’s endemic corruption; regarding the murders committed by his personal guard, Vargas affirms “not to have committed any crime”. The film goes to the verge of martyrizing the president through the inclusion of actual footage of widespread mourning as his coffin is ceremoniously paraded through the streets of Rio. Indeed, the president’s suicide is portrayed as a sacrifice for the people.

The humorous and light-hearted tone of Soares’ work lends itself to the feel of a quasi-picaresque novel whose cast of characters are pulled from the underworld of anarchy, gangs and brothels. The work also includes caricaturized versions of international literary and historical personalities, weaving the episode of Vargas’ suicide into the tapestry of western popular culture.

If Jardim’s film verges on the sanctification of Vargas’ suicide as a patriotic and desperate act, Soares’ novel is the profanation of Death and the political ideologies that call for it.

Screening

Getúlio (2014) dir. by João Jardim

Introduced by Ambassador José Vicente Pimentel 

 

Date: December 3rd

Time: 7pm 

FREE ADMISSION

Local:
Media Commons Film Theatre – Robarts Library 3rd Floor
130 St. George st, Subway St. George University of Toronto

20 centavos screening this Friday, Nov 27, 2:00 pm

Latin American Studies invites you to:

Film Screening and Panel: 20 Centavos
Date: Fri. 27 Nov, 2015 2:00 pm

Location: Jackman Humanities Bldg. Room 100A
Please join us for a screening of Brazilian film "20 Centavos". Panel to follow.

In the summer of 2013, Brazilians took over the streets in a nation wide protest. What started as a protest against an increase in public transport fees in São Paulo, quickly evolved into a popular movement against many things (corruption, the government, and the World Cup were some of the items mentioned). Please join us to watch this documentary that tries to show how the movement quickly evolved into something quite different than the organizers of the first protests had envisioned. The screening will be followed by a discussion moderated by Mariana Mota Prado, Associate Dean for the Graduate Program at the Faculty of Law, and with the participation of Dr. Juan P. Marsiaj and Prof. Hudson Moura.

Watch the trailer of 20 Centavos here:

Workshop: Music Medicine: The Use of Afro-Brazilian Music as an Intervention

Music has the command to transcend class, culture, and evoke stories long forgotten. In an unpublished pilot study, I enquired how residents at a retirement facility experience Afro- Brazilian Music. The participants in this study were of majority Protestant European background, high socio-economic status and well educated. The music component represented the antithesis of the study population; religious cultural music expression from people associated with the African Diaspora via the African Slave Trade to Brazil.

The music, a combination of classical acoustic guitar with nature sounds in the background, and accompanied by a voice singing in the ancient idiom of Yoruba, the common vernacular of Afro- based religious songs of the Northeast of Brazil, set the platform for residents to draw upon, for their stories. 

The Workshop
Through the use of Afro-Brazilian music, students will be presented with the opportunity to participate in an exercise for achieving a deepened state of relaxation. All that is required is an open mind. The purpose of this workshop is to demonstrate the effectiveness of Afro-Brazilian music as music medicine. 

Date and Local
Tuesday, December 8th

Time: 3 pm - 4 pm

TF 102 - Teefy Hall (57 Queen’s Park Crescent East) University of Toronto

Free Attendance


Alicia Howard is a PhD candidate in Music Education with an emphasis on Music Medicine at the University of Toronto, Faculty of Music. Her doctoral research focuses on the effects of music on Temporomandibular Joint Disorder Symptoms (TMD). Alicia’s study is being conducted at Mount Sinai Hospital's Wasser Pain Management Centre. Her past research investigated the effects of music and poetry therapy on substance abuse populations. Alicia is a past recipient of the University of Florida’s Brazilian Language and Cultural Fellowship. (www.ritmundi.com)

Talk: Capoeira or Capuera? by Master Marcio Mendes

Capoeira or Capuera?

The history of a Brazilian Martial Art

 

 

 

 

Talk by Master Marcio Mendes

Tuesday, November 24 @ 3 pm

TF 102 - Teefy Hall (57 Queen’s Park Crescent East) University of Toronto

Free Attendance / Talk in English

Capuera or capoeira? Is it a dance? A fight? Or a game? Has it begun in Africa or Brazil? In this talk you will have an overview about different aspects of capuera: its definition, history, music and movements. We will go through a short journey about where and when it all began. In 2014 UNESCO acknowledge it as an Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. We will also discuss on the way the movements define their styles from ancient to modern ones such as TRECIRAL.

Master Márcio Mendes is from Belém, Amazon Region in Brazil. In Canada since 1999, Mendes has given classes, performances, and lectures in several universities including Canada, England, Angola, Mozambique, Germany, Australia, Trinidad & Tobago, Turkey and Portugal. Mendes holds a MA in Fine Art from York University and currently pursuing a philosophy degree. He published a book on TRECIRAL technic created based on capuera and Afro-Brazilian religion movements.

XII Semana da Língua Portuguesa

XII SEMANA DA LÍNGUA PORTUGUESA

2 a 9 de novembro de 2015

Universidade de Toronto

Victoria College

91 Charles Street West

SEGUNDA-FEIRA, 2 DE NOVEMBRO
10h00
Exposição - Autoretratos lusófonos
A exposição ficará patente ao público até ao dia 9 de novembro
Local: 2.º andar do Victoria College (Hall)

12h15
Abertura oficial da exposição e entrega do Prémio Pedro da Silva
(cortesia da Caixa Geral de Depósitos a confirmar)

12h30- 14h00
Brasil sobre a mesa – compreender a comida brasileira e a sua história,
por Isabel Pimentel (jornalista)
Sabores da comida lusófona
Local: sala VC 213

TERÇA-FEIRA, 3 DE NOVEMBRO
10h00 – 12h00     
Passeio pela zona antiga do Little Portugal, por Domingos Marques (autor)
Local: Northrop Frye Hall – rés-do-chão

11h00 – 15h00     
Bake Sale, organizada pela UTPA (University of Toronto – Portuguese Association)
Local: Northrop Frye Hall – rés-do-chão

QUARTA-FEIRA, 4 DE NOVEMBRO
8h00 – 16h00       
Adopt-a-student Day (dia de orientação para alunos do liceu, organizado pela UTPA (University of Toronto – Portuguese Association)
Abertura:  Porquê estudar português?, por Manuela Marujo
Local: Debates Room, Hart House, 7 Hart House circle

16h00 – 17h30     
Workshops de dança - afro-brasileira e moderna com Newton Moraes e forró com Raíssa Siqueira e Gabriel Freire
Local: Music Room, Hart House, 7 Hart House circle
Os workshops têm a duração de 30 minutos

QUINTA-FEIRA, 5 DE NOVEMBRO
11h00 – 12h00     
A linguagem jornalística, por Maria Inês Almeida (jornalista e escritora)
Local: Emmanuel College, sala 108

19h00                   
Projeção e debate do filme "O Vento Lá Fora" (Brasil, 2015)
A poesia de Fernando Pessoa lida pela cantora Maria Bethânia e pela professora Cleonice Berardinelli (Filme inédito no Canadá - Sem legendas em inglês)
Local: Media Commons Film Theatre, Robarts Library (3rd Floor, 130 St George St.)

SEXTA-FEIRA, 6 DE NOVEMBRO
19h00                   
Bate Papo (Language Circle onde brasileiros e alunos de português se reúnem para conversar e praticar a língua de Camões)
Local: O’Grady’s Tap & Grill (171 College St.)

SÁBADO, 7 DE NOVEMBRO
11h00 – 15h00     
Sábado da Feijoada Beneficente - O Brazuca vai reverter a renda ao Saúde Criança
Local: Yauca’s Lounge (755 Dovercourt Rd.)

Click the image to enlarge the poster

Filmes brasileiros no cinema da biblioteca Robarts

 
(o vento lá fora) (2015)
November 5th, 2015 @ 7pm

A Toronto premiere, this documentary presents a portrait of Portuguese poet Fernando Pessoa through readings of his poems by professor Cleonice Berardinelli and famous singer Maria Bethânia. (No English Subtitles)

 
Getúlio (2014)
December 3rd, 2015 @ 7pm

Based on true facts, the film explores the personal and political reasons that lead Brazil’s former dictator Getúlio Vargas, reelected by direct vote, to choose suicide over resignation in the midst of a serious crisis involving corruption and treason. (Subtitled in English)

For Sale or Rent (2013)
January 7th, 2016 @ 7pm 

Rio de Janeiro. Maria Alice (Marieta Severo) lives in an old luxurious home at the proximity of a favela. She works as a free-lancer translator, even for her drug dealer neighbors, but she knows that the only way to solve her problems is selling the house. (Subtitled in English)

 FREE ADMISSION

Media Commons Film Theatre – Robarts Library 3rd Floor
130 St. George st, Subway St. George University of Toronto

Coordinator: Hudson Moura
More info: hudson.moura @ utoronto.ca

Brazil Film Series is a partnership between the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at the University of Toronto, the Consulate General of Brazil in Toronto, the Rio Film Commission (RFC), and the University of Toronto Libraries, which aims to promote the Brazilian culture and to acknowledge the Portuguese language in line with the directives of the Cultural Department of the Ministry of the External Relations of Brazil. This showcase is addressed to those who, in Toronto, are interested in Brazil, aiming not only at the academic community but also at the community at large. Each film will be shown with English subtitles (exceptions will be noted) and it will be introduced by a guest speaker. This showcase will be running every first Thursday of the month until April 2016.

Click to enlarge the poster