My initial impressions of the first bit of the film strike me with two general themes: class and gender. The main character is running around the city and experiences several instances of a lack of female autonomy within the city, perhaps it better said that there is a lack of respect for female autonomy. For instance, when she gets stock in a group to dance she is trapped in between many men whom are blocking her exit, she is only able to exit the dance circle when she is freed by another woman. The presumed protagonist (I have no prior knowledge to Orpheus and this is strictly based off my viewing of the first few minutes) experiences a world where there are hundreds of factors that impact her life, which is shown by the chaos of the market and the city during Carnival, one of the recurring factors is the constantly uninvited touches and comments from men and how the men act around her.
The other theme is that of class. Though there seems to be some inter-mingling of the races within the first eleven minutes, I didn’t notice any white children, and when we see children in the film they are generally black and shown as poor. Perhaps the implications of this are to highlight the disparities that Brazil has regarding race, for positive or negative I’m not too sure yet. Often, I think that in the case of Latin America, race and class are often interchangeable because of the consequences of colonialism, though I think this is becoming slightly less prevalent these days
I also think of the past scholars of racial democracy and that idea can potentially play a role on how this film is perceived by the outside world. I wonder if when I watch more of the film later if I will see those themes of racial democracy. Because I consider Brazil to be one of the homes of this ideology which is the stance I pull from Abdias do Nascimento’s “The Myth of Racial Democracy”. So, I’m curious as to which themes may pop out as I continue to watch the film.
Question: “What aspects of race, class, and gender can be pulled from the first eleven minutes of the film? Are these experiences strictly Brazilian or can they be applied to other Latin American experiences?”
hi Dylan!
I have no prior knowledge of Black Orpheus as well, and I was wondering why the women looked so uncomfortable in the city. Now that I read your impression on the ‘lack of female autonomy’, it makes a lot more sense and I agree to your idea!
Hi Dylan! I enjoyed reading your post. I’m Mexican but from a Spanish family, so I’m mostly white and look it, so I found your observations regarding the interconnection between class and race particularly interesting. I know in Spain there was the concept of “purity of blood/limpieza de sangre” that was related to race, or the amount of white “blood” one has– you can see in the language how there is a sense whereby one is conceived as clean and the other, consequently, is conceived as dirty or unclean. I know the Portuguese also had this concept, so I don’t think your conclusion is mistaken. Unfortunately, things have not changed as much as they should, and though I don’t know about Brazil, I know that in my country wealth distribution is highly correlated with race.
Hi Dylan! I agree with you in terms of the theme of gender playing a role in the first 11 minutes of Black Orpheus. Especially when she is trying to make her way to her cousins home and as you say she keeps getting derailed because men are dancing around her and some being more provocative than others. However unhelpful this is she ends up making it, and Orpheus is flirting with her then at the end of the line, she is portrayed as the “female in distress” and needs help throughout these scenes.
Great post! I noticed a couple other blog posts mentioning how Latin America seems to be more tolerant of racial minorities based on this film and I guess from other representations in the media as well. Unfortunately, I would have to argue that Latin America is much more stratified based on racial and gender lines because afro-latinxs are hardly acknowledged in every day life. In Mexico, for example, they only acknowledged their historically Black communities (with 1.3 million people) on the East coast in 2015. Plus, it is commonplace for people to joke about being too dark and associating darker skin with undesirable traits versus being pale; machismo also poses a very real threat to women in Latin America, which is represented in that one scene you also mentioned. Like Jon said in the previous lecture, carnival is probably the one day that afro-Brazilians can share their culture (albeit commodified) and then return to living marginally the rest of the year so there is a lot to unpack.
You made some really good points when pointing out the major themes that stuck with you, namely gender and class. that tied in well with your comment on racial democracy. I would also tend to believe that Brazil is not what we consider a racial democracy from what I understand given the treatment of minorities in many instances. and with black Orpheus, I guess there are indications to that given the portrayal of economic conditions faced by black people, while also showing the importance of cultural events such as carnival that can bring together all different groups in the country.