JARDIM DE GUERRA

The first feature film by Brazilian director Neville d’Almeida, Jardim de Guerra tells the story of a young man with no prospects, played by actor Joel Barcelos. He falls in love with a filmmaker and is unjustly accused of terrorism by a right-wing organisation which arrests and tortures him. In 1969, the film inaugurated the Directors’ Fortnight at the Cannes Film Festival.

In spite of some festival screenings, when Neville sent a copy to be approved and commercially screened, the film suffered countless cuts and was ultimately censored by the Brazilian military regime. The original copy, with no cuts, which was kept by the National Archive in Rio de Janeiro, will have its first public screening in São Paulo at the 42nd Mostra. The plot of Jardim de Guerra was inspired by the book Kaos (1962), by Jorge Mautner, who cowrote the screenplay along with Neville, Guará Rodrigues and Rogério Sganzerla.

Born in Minas Gerais, Brazil, in 1941. He started his career in cinema at the Center for Cinematographic Studies, in Belo Horizonte. Neville was one of the founders of CEMICE, the Minas Gerais Center for Experimental Cinema. In 1973, with Hélio Oiticica, he conceived and made Cosmococa - Programs in Progress, shown at countless art institutions in Brazil and all over the world. Jardim de Guerra (1968) and Piranhas do Asfalto (1970), his firsts movies, were censured by the military dictatorship. Other films were forbidden, cut, and later, screened. The filmmaker also directed feature films such as Mangue Bangue (1971), Lady on the Bus (1978), The Seven Kittens (1980), Rio Babilônia (1982), Matou a Família e Foi ao Cinema (1991), Razor in the Flesh (1997), Maksuara Twilight of the Gods (2007, 32 nd Mostra), this one made in partnership with Tamur Aimara, and A Frente Fria que a Chuva Traz (2015).

43ª MOSTRA INTERNACIONAL DE CINEMA

43ª MOSTRA INTERNACIONAL DE CINEMA