and that's about the deepest thought that the protagonist of 'hour of the star' ever has. i first tried to watch this film years ago at a university foreign film festival, in what was possible the hottest movie theatre on the planet. i didn't last long. several years ago i read the short novel by clarice lispector, called by an american translator "rare person who looked like marlene dietrich and wrote like virginia woolf". which makes it all the more impressive that someone who looked like dietrich could write a character that looked like macabea and be utterly convincing. written shortly before she died in 1977, 'hour of the star' became an iconic piece of brazilian literature, even though lispector lived most of her life away from brazil.
this was the debut directorial effort from suzana amaral in 1985. the first thing that came to mind when watching the film again is the brazilian film of a few years earlier, 'pixote'. and i sincerely hope that's the last time i ever have to think of 'pixote'. i think in america that we have this image of brazil as all ronaldinho and supermodels, when it may be much more 'carandiru' and 'hour of the star'.
everything about macabea is painful and awkward and wrong, like laura miller in my seventh grade year. she's an orphan, she's naive and ignorant, yet for most of the film she is unflappably contented and accepting, whether moving a sheet over the spot where she wet the bed, or thinking that she's seducing what turns out to be a blind man. she lives in what is not quite grinding poverty, but close enough. on sundays, she rides the metro for fun. people she considers her friends regularly make remarks like 'your face doesn't help'. marcelia cartaxo, as macabea, does have a grand moon-face, but with these eyes shining out of it that are otherworldly in their optimism. and it's when she's at her happiest that you want to cry. ridiculously forgiving and completely unaware of herself ('i'm not much of a person'), she happens upon a sleazy, gold-toothed, weaselly non-boyfriend. things turn from bad to worse, and we as the audience can see some sort of catastrophe coming a mile away, although macabea thinks that she may well turn out a film star or the wife of a rich foreigner.
just two complaints about this film - one is the soundtrack. it alternates between a very respectable classical piece, and this keyboard number that you would expect in a mystery science theater 3000 thriller. it sort of jars the pace a bit. an the ending would have maintained the power and devastation that it had in the book if it could have been a bit more subtle.
all in all, lovely. i think i would have liked it better if i hadn't read the book, but it was a pretty masterful translation overall.
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