BEHIND THE SUN
Programme
Notes
The novel Broken April by
Ismail Kadare is the basis for this film. The novel was originally set in the
Balkans of the 1930's. With the authors blessing, Salles removes the action
to Brazil of 1910. In any case, the tale of a blood feud could be set anywhere
where people kill each other out of loyalty to someone or something.
Two families are generations into a bloody feud. The reason for the feud is
over land rights but its origins are long forgotten. Yet neither family has
got to the point where it can see the futility of killing and the pointlessness
of their deadly ritual. One family lives in poverty the other is well off. The
two families can be seen as the cinema cliché of have's and have nots;
one stuck in the past, the other modernising, moving on but in so doing increasing
the other's poverty but this is not a fight over wealth.
The ritual of killing is well practised. A man dies at the hand of another. His blood stained shirt is hung out until the red bloodstain has turned yellow. Then the eldest son of the grieving family kills the killer and the cycle resumes. 'Kid' who knows that it is his beloved elder brother, Tonho that is next and for whom such a loss is as unfathomable as it is absurd, questions this cycle of revenge and reprisal. That his mother and father never got round to giving him a proper name says much about how they see their lives.
A chance meeting with a passing circus act, affects the brothers and hope anew springs forth. The Kid is even given a name - Pacu. We have little sympathy for the elders but we do want the brothers to have better lives and the spark that the circus ignites is the first good thing to happen to them. However, is this newfound hope enough to break the cycle? Will one of them get the girl? Will brotherly love be enough to win the day? And will they get to see the ocean? The key question, however, is do they realise they have the power to determine their own destiny? How the answer to that question unfolds will keep you captivated until the final frame.
A visually stunning piece of filmmaking, Behind The Sun is both tragic and uplifting. Its visual power is courtesy of camerawork by multi-award winning Walter Carvalho.