Following up this week‘s episode (Ep. 293 - Catch a Wheat! with Felipe Pepe) i’ll give my two cents about Bacurau, some details that are harder to get if you're not brazilian.
**This posts contains major spoilers about the movie** so if you plan to watch it, be warned or read it after doing so!
I'll tag @"exodus"#3 and @"yeso"#385 because they manifested interest in this.
Do not take everything i say here as the absolute truth, since we're always prone to our own backgrounds, opinions and interpretation.
I’ll start by saying this movie really hit home for me. I was born in Sao Paulo, southeast Brazil but my parents are from Maranhao, northeast Brazil, not the same state but the same region where the movie takes place. The culture and mores are the same, down to the accent. I was raised by two incredible _nordestinos_ (northeastern brazilians) with their fighting spirit and the “never lower your head” attitude.
The funeral scene is pretty much authentic for smaller cities in northeast. My Grandparents where send off this way. The ceremony held at their house, with a crowd transporting the coffin to the grave afterwards, with music playing in some manner.
When my mother died here in Sao Paulo, the ritual was different. We didn’t hold the ceremony at home but we did the music thing when transporting her coffin. We chose the song [“Vermelho” by Chico da Silva/Julinho Teixeira and sung by Fafá de Belém](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_pLDbrOjo4). The song is about [one of the two oxes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bumba_Meu_Boi), one representing the tradition (blue), and other the oppressed (red) which the song talks about. In politics, this song is an anthem of the Left.
We did the same when my father passed away, we played [“Canção da América (Unencounter)” by Milton Nascimento](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75kf9y_fukM) . It’s a song about friendship, specially remembering when friends go away.
The city of Bacurau can be seen as an allegory to Canudos, an alternative society that was massacrated in the [War of Canudos](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_Canudos), Euclides da Cunha wrote [“Os Sertões”](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Os_Sert%C3%B5es) as a way to describe the facts that took place in this conflict. His writing was something like forensics/detective work to determine what happened.
If i remember correctly, he would send his writing by mail, narrating each conflict almost in real time (by that era's standards) and later it was compiled and edited into the book.
Some say Canudos was a proto-communist society. It saddens me that historical bias erased a lot of things we could’ve known about it. Sure, we learn about it in school but i’d say it’s superficial.
The mayor scene showing up and dumping old books is nuanced because at some point we learn he’s a grandson of a (presumably) former mayor.
This is a nod to [Coronelism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coronelism), a way of political control by forcing the voters to elect the “colonel” (not an actual military colonel). If they didn’t, they’d die. Often the “colonels” would stay decades in power, being replaced by their own through time.This kinda exists to this day, in a lesser degree.
As a response to the oppression, the [Cangaço](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canga%C3%A7o) was born.
Canudos, Coronelism and Cangaço all happened kinda simultaneously. Coronelism was way too strong, and the Cangaço was a way to fight back.
It is often described as an “social banditry” phenomenon where the Cangaceiros (the cangaço warriors/folks) would straight up kill, threaten or sabotage the colonels. They were almost nomads, fighting to protect the peasants. Most of northeastern brazillians see them as heroes despite historical bias tending to portrait them as villains.
Their leather hat is the icon for them. The hat can be seen wore by the guy that wants to open the church and also in the museum.
The most famous cangaceiro was Virgulino Ferreira da Silva [“Lampião”](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lampi%C3%A3o) (“Oil lantern” - he got this name because he could fire a lever-action rifle so quickly that it looked like he was holding a lamp).
He became a cangaceiro when his parents died because of colonels dispute over territory. He swore to avenge them and try to free people from the colonel’s oppression.
He’s a hero in my family’s point of view. In 1938 he and his crew were ambushed, killed and beheaded. Their heads were displayed on the sidewalk of the city as a message to others.
A picture of decapitated heads can be seen at the museum scene, i think it is a nod to this.
Lunga is clearly the head of the cangaceiros. Being queer, it can also be a nod to the fact that a retired judge wrote a book about Lampião’s life, which contains a small segment insinuating that he was homossexual. The book was banned for a few years when Lampião’s granddaughter sued the author.
Bacurau can be percieved as a city of Cangaceiros or a city that hides/protects cangaceiros, also seen in the museum scene where there’s a newspaper cut-out, lots of guns and artifacts. The way the whole city is kinda trained to deal with invasions corroborates this.
The movie also touches on a few other themes such as xenophobia from brazilian south-southeast brazil towards north-northeasterns. Historically, south-southeast has a European immigrant background (mostly from Italy and Germany), which is a more recent immigration (ending of XIX and beginning of XX century) than the north-northeastern one (that can be traced as far back as XV-XVI century)
Thus, the motorbikers are represented this way. I swear to you that i’ve met people like that.
South-southeasterns also tend to have prejudice against northeasterns because northeast has the majority of left wing voters in the country. Brazilian politics is not so two-party system as the US.
The use of psychotropics can be related to the native indigenous population. Specifically in Pernambuco (the state where Bacurau is) i was able to find the Xucuru de Cimbres, a native population reserve that uses some psychotropics. When the “doctor” warns people about the medicines that the mayor delivered, it is also a nod to this. Some people prefer to use local medicine, based of plants and stuff. The seed guy even cultivates a lot of them!
There's also a Roda de Capoeira (circle of capoeira) when the night falls and people are getting ready to fight. Capoeira is a mix of cultural dance, sport and martial art developed in PERNAMBUCO's Quilombo dos Palmares (a Quilombo is a place where enslaved people would escape to). Usually people practice it with songs going on to give the rythm and they enact a fight, but moving reaaaally slow so anyone can do it, despite of physical condition, age etc.
You may recognize Capoeira since it is Tekken's Eddy Gordo fighting style.
Quilombo dos Palmares specifically was the biggest quilombo ever, it was so huge that the government tried to end it for more than 100 years and always lost the fight. Zumbi dos Palmares was it's leader and founder. Dandara dos Palmares, Zumbi's wife, is a feminist icon.
The guitar guy is a repentista, a singer of [“Repente”](https://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Repente).
Repente is a musical art style based on improvised poetry music. It is very satirical, you can view it as a diss rap battle of sorts. Usually there’s two repentistas singing at each other, who can burn the other the most, wins.
It is a great northeastern art form, i lol’d so much when he was singing to the bikers. The bikers didn’t even understood that they where being mocked and i’m 100% positive that this would happen to all southeasterns in real life lmao
The theme song for the movie, [Requiem para Matraga](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6Zwyf0tDS8) by Geraldo Vandré goes like this:
Vim aqui só pra dizer
(i’m here just to say)
Ninguém há de me calar
(nobody shall shut me up)
Se alguém tem que morrer
(If someone has to die)
Que seja pra melhorar
(so be it to get things better)
Tanta vida pra viver
(So much life to live)
Tanta vida a se acabar
(so much life to end)
Com tanto pra se fazer
(with so much to do)
Com tanto pra se salvar
(with so much to save)
Você que não me entendeu
(whom don’t understand me)
Não perde por esperar
(just wait for it) ((in the sense of “you don’t see it coming”))
Geraldo Vandré was an important musician from the era of military dictatorship in Brazil.
Since there was a heavy censor going on, artists had to sneak protest into their lyrics.
Geraldo Vandré did not hide anything, his lyrics were straight on the face of the military dictators. There are reports of him being tortured in Brazil and Chile, he ended up being exiled in Europe and appearing in Brazil wearing brazilian military air force uniform years after.
Being questioned, he stated: “Geraldo Vandré died in 1968 (presumably after the torture).
I’m now Geraldo Pedrosa de Araújo Dias. “
After that he refrained from playing, making music and appearing in public. He is still alive somewhere in Sao Paulo, making rare public appearances and much rarer music playing.
His songs are seen as an anthem for the oppressed people.
There are a lot of details i’ve noticed in the movie but most of them were just aesthetic. I hope i did a good job with this post!
