A couple of these videos have been floating around for awhile, but Diário do Rio had a few new ones so I decided to share them all. While I was going through looking for links, I found some other videos I'd never seen, and had so much fun watching them.
The movie comes out April 8th in Brazil, but here in the US, we have to wait a whole extra week for the premiere, and it can't come soon enough!
Continuing with my Q&A series, I had the chance to chat with Leighton Gage, an American crime novelist who sets his books in Brazil. Leighton has lived all over the world, and like many of us who write about Brazil, is married to a Brazilian and has spent a great deal of time living and traveling in Brazil. I've read four of his novels, which star Chief Inspector Mario Silva, who investigates crimes throughout Brazil. There's a lot of detail about São Paulo and Brasília, but there's also scenes in Rio, Manaus, rural São Paulo state, and other areas of Brazil. While his books are fiction, he incorporates real themes into the plots, things like the MST, police corruption, and immigration, blending reality and fantasy. His latest book, A Vine in the Blood, is coming out this year. Leighton also contributes to a crime novelist blog, where he writes about Brazilian news, history and culture.
Using Brazil as the setting for a series of crime novels isn't very common. Why did you decide on Brazil? The answer to that one is embedded in the question. I decided to do it exactly because it isn’t very common. I’m an avid reader of the genre, and after I’d worked my way through Garcia-Roza’s work, and Rubem Fonseca’s and Patricia Melo’s, I started running out of options. A friend of mine, a lady I share a blog with, lives and works in Iceland. They have a population of a little over 300,000 people, hardly any crime at all, and more crime writers than Brazil does. It’s crazy.
You use a fair amount of Portuguese in the novels, and not just in the dialogue. Why was that important to you as a writer? I think it adds atmosphere. Hemingway did too. Some folks, including my editor, don’t particularly like it. And, sometimes, they tell me to either explain those words – or take them out.
You've spent a lot of time living and traveling in Brazil. Which place or city is your favorite? Currently? Florianopolis. But I might feel differently next week. Or even tomorrow. My preferences change. Sometimes, it’s because I’ve changed, or the locale has changed. Or because the season makes a difference. Or because I’m keeping different company. But I will say one thing: there’s not a single city, not a single state, in Brazil that I dislike. I love them all.
Before the premiere, there was a press conference that seemed to go pretty well...until they let Jamie Foxx talk:
When I first read about the ridiculous comment, I wasn't surprised, but I figured a PR person would warn him that it wasn't the best tactic to take and to cut it out. But at the premiere, American reporters were no help:
I know I sound like a broken record, but I can't stress enough what a spectacularly stupid idea it is to perpetuate sexual stereotypes about Brazilian women, particularly when you are trying to do PR in Brazil. It makes you look bad, and by proxy, whatever you're trying to promote, and it can really irritate people. Anne Hathaway's approach was much more the way to go. Anyway.
The movie has had mixed reviews so far from the Brazilian press; G1 was fairly effusive, but an O Dia review complained the movie had lots of clichés, like scenes of Carnival and thieves robbing tourists, and likened the movie to Zé Carioca films. Still, I can't wait to see it.
Another cool thing: after the star-studded premiere in Lagoa and an ad campaign on the Copacabana Palace, the movie will be shown in Complexo do Alemão in a series of free public screenings. Carlos Saldanha will attend an event there tomorrow for public school students and will be honored the city mayor, and will be joined by several cast members.
It's difficult to quantify the success of Obama's Brazil visit, but in the end, I think the results were mixed.
Although the visit was intended to be largely symbolic, at some point there has to be something concrete to provide evidence and build trust that there's potential for change and for things to move forward. In Brazil, Obama's symbolic diplomacy fell flat for some, as very little was decided. Despite last minute rumors, he did not in fact publicly and definitively support Brazil's bid for a permanent seat on the UN Security Council, and the ten bilateral accords that were signed were not ground-breaking, or were mostly formalizing mutual interests. (Needless to say, Obama did not lift the tourist visa requirement).
In Brasília, a few things didn't go as the US organizers had hoped. Before Obama's arrival, Brazilian officials canceled the press conference where reporters would be able to question Dilma and Obama directly. In the end, though, I think Dilma's admistration was shielding Obama as much as it was Dilma from tricky questions that would have taken away from the air of cooperation and diplomacy the Brasília events were meant to foster. But Obama and Dilma did speak briefly, and Dilma, for her part, did an excellent job laying the groundwork for some of the baseline goals Brazil has for a better relationship with the US.
Then, at another event, Brazilian ministers were annoyed when American security officials subjected them to a search, after a supposed official agreement was made that ministers would not be subjected to being searched at Obama's Brasília events. Four of the ministers failed to pick up translation devices, so when the event began in English, they got up and left. The snafu had many up in arms, complaining of humiliation, being treated as inferior, and even infringing on Brazilian sovereignty, though some were amused by high level government officials being treated like normal people. Between this saia justa and the cancellation of Obama's public speech, it seemed to show serious discord and miscommunication between Obama's security teams and event organizers, and in the end, diplomacy was left behind in the name of security.
Finally, Lula did not attend any events and did not meet with Obama during his visit, which some claimed was a snub. It may have been, but Lula has been very careful to make sure not to step on Dilma's toes and to make sure he doesn't overshadow her. Another theory (thanks Julia) is that Lula was angry that Dilma didn't personally invite him, instead of being invited by Itamaraty. Either way, I think it probably worked to Dilma's advantage.
The other major problem, which has been one of the biggest problems with Obama's administration in general, is that his rhetoric simply didn't match his actions. While he spoke of cooperation and equality, and forging ties to work together in an effort to build trust with Brazilians, no major agreements were made (see above) and the US launched an offensive in Libya, which Brazil opposed. After cancelling Obama's public address at the last minute, it seemed like par for the course - the US government reneging and failing to live up to its promises, not daring to pursue a new, albeit riskier course of action.
There were protests in Rio, which appeared to be the usual left wing, anti-American, the oil is ours type crowd, but there were also anti-war protesters given the military action in Libya. While there was the usual "go home gringo" BS, there was also plenty of skepticism, which was warranted.
In Rio, Obama seemed to fare a bit better. He visited City of God without incident, although after community members had complained about security teams, many wound up disappointed as Obama and his family spent only a half an hour in the favela, where he watched a private, rather demure children's performance, played a bit of soccer, and then promptly left, hardly speaking to anyone in the community. (This, after extensive last minute efforts to "clean up" just to receive him) Last on the agenda, Obama and his family finished the visit with a night pit stop at the Cristo Redentor. Cariocas were understandably miffed with the terrible traffic caused by the visit, though others cautioned that with such bad traffic on a Sunday, transportation in the city would really need to change before 2014.
Obama's heralded Rio speech had mixed results. Those in attendance found themselves under Obama's spell of charisma and powerful speaking skills, though a few noted it seemed like pandering. Blogger Julia Michaels, who scored tickets to the speech, told me she noticed that the speech didn't entirely fit the audience, since it was moved from a speech for the masses to one for a very elite crowd. His reference to Vasco was not exactly fitting for his audience (you can hear booing in the video), and the Paulo Coelho quote was extremely ill advised. (The Paulo Coelho bit made me think he didn't run the speech by a Brazil expert, or if he did, he or she was too afraid to tell him to change it) Julia did note, however, how important it was for Obama to be in Brazil and to get things right, especially after ridiculous occurrences with past American presidents (see: Reagan and Bush).
Still, much ado was made about the success of the visit. BBC declared "most people seemed happy to see the US president visiting Brazil and acknowledging the growing importance of the South American country on the world stage," citing the visit's "symbolic success." A headline from Globo about Obama's speech proclaimed "Obama says the US and Brazil must be equal partners." Others saw the visit as an opportunity to prepare for upcoming international events.
One missing element was that Obama made very little reference to the importance of his African heritage, which is one thing that has helped make him popular in Brazil. It would have been really interesting if Obama had had time to go to Salvador, the heart of African culture in Brazil, to work his diplomatic charms. (In other news, a local NGO in Bahia put up a funny sign in honor of Obama's visit, even though they knew he wouldn't be up north.) Though some black Brazilians (including, for example, actor Lazaro Ramos and Obama's Brazilian look alike) were able to attend Obama's Rio speech, many more were shut out when the venue was changed.
In short, the visit could have gone better, especially if American agencies had all been on the same page, and had coordinated better with Brazilian authorities. But in the end, rhetorical diplomacy was not enough. There needs to be a lot less talking and a lot more action to gain trust from Brazilians and to make a legitimate break from the past. Otherwise, it will just be more of the same - which, sadly, has largely been the case here in the US under the Obama administration. At the same time, the visit did seem to indicate that there's a lot of opportunity for those of us working with both countries to do more to bridge the gap, and how important it is to share information and knowledge as we work on those efforts.
I was in DC over the weekend, attending a Brazil conference amongst other things, and I've been following Obama's visit as much as I can, but have a lot of catching up to do this week. If anyone has any suggested reading, articles, or videos, please feel free to post them in the comments or shoot me an email. My overall reaction is one of mixed feelings, in that some pretty key mishaps strained the supposed good will that the trip was supposed to foster. Anyway, I'll try to get a post up tomorrow or Tuesday, and I'll also include a post about the conference some time this week.
On the eve of Obama's visit to Brazil, things don't seem to be off to the best start. Alleging security reasons, the powers that be cancelled Obama's public address in Rio, and will move the speech inside to the Teatro Municipal to a much smaller audience. It's unclear who exactly the audience will be or how invitations will be made. Either way, it's a massive diplomatic faux pas. If the security teams and organizers knew the challenge of holding the event would be too great, they should have never planned it, and never announced it. Not only is it disappointing, but it's the kind of slap in the face the visit was supposed to avoid, and exactly the wrong way to speak to the Brazilian people: by inviting and speaking to an "elite" few, instead of making it a public event. The upside is that it was already causing some problems in getting around Cinelandia in preparation for the event, which may be a tiny bit alleviated since the speech was moved indoors.
In other news, some people in the Cidade de Deus favela are upset about Obama's visit, which will supposedly make it difficult to get around on Sunday. The main favela community organization has now refused to participate in the event.
Now more than ever, Obama is going to have an even greater challenge of making this visit work. Let's hope for the best.
