Shortly after the first screening in 1895, film as an art began to proliferate in areas all over the world. Now, movies are carefully constructed works of art combining both the visual and aural realms of human perception. When discussing the history of Brazilian film, though, it is impossible to separate the art of film from the social and political text of Brazil's history. Unlike the United States, Brazil historically confronted more problems with the new art form: financial difficulties affecting production and screening, as well as political problems like censorship. To examine where Brazilian cinema is today, one must go back further than the revolutionary Cinema Novo. One must begin with the Golden Age of early Brazilian film and move through the darker periods, when Brazil was invaded with foreign language films. Still today, Brazil can not compete financially with the massive profit-hounding expertise of Hollywood. The interesting result of these difficulties is the constant dialogue between Brazilian film and the Brazilian people. While the United States also has its period movements: the studio years, the great depression films (giant monster mo

While the chanchada did remain popular for several decades, with hundreds of examples, it slowly declined into vulgarity, and became the pornochanchada by the 1970's. But with its hopes, its misfortunes were also exposed. The chanchada, though popular, was not popular enough to beat out the foreign films (now dubbed in Portuguese), still dominating Brazilian markets. It also left the giant taste of Brazil's tropical stereotype in the mouths of the world: "The image of Brazil, for many non-Brazilians, is a bewildering potpourri of piranha-infested waters, samba and romance, carnival and coffee, Black Orpheus and Carmen Miranda." (p.351 BC) This "vulgarity" of the chanchada instigated the creation of the Vera Cruz film company and studio in the 1940's.

In 1955, with the election of Kubitschek, Brazil found itself face to face with a new optimism. With developmentalist nationalism turning its mighty gears and creating such creatures as Brasilia, the early filmmakers of Cinema Novo were young and full of hope. Following Kubitschek was the failure of populism and the monster of inflation, the hopes of these same filmmakers, now a bit older, were dashed. Beginning primarily with Nelson Pereira dos Santos, Cinema Novo would never truly separate itself from politics. Reacting against the failure of the Vera Cruz studio attempt, the Novo directors relied on the influence of the French New Wave and Italian Neo-realism to school them. The result was a movement in constant dialogue with the political and social realm of a new Brazil. Within this social and political realm exists three periods that influenced the movement of the Novo directors.

The Escola de Artes Cinematograficas Azzurri began from the bits and pieces of what was earlier Brazil's most reliable base for film production: the news-film. Being interested in Brazilian, rather than foreign news, this non-fiction market still had an audience amidst the influx of foreign fiction films. Gilberto Rossi was one of these filmmakers: producing and shooting his own propaganda and news films that lead to the formation of the Escola. With the formation of the Brazilian school, money and students brought new interest to the art of the Brazilian fiction film. Other such schools began to spring up all over Brazil. With the Escola up and running, Rossi collaborated with Jose Medina to make several fiction films. After several successes in the Brazilian box offices, Medina and Rossi would make their only studio film in 1929: Fragmentos da Vida ("Fragments of Life"). "Erich von Stroheim reportedly praised the film when he saw it at the Fourth Centennial Celebration of the City of Sao Paulo." (p.23 BC) With these such successes, Brazilian Cinema slowly found itself recovering from foreign products, but only slightly. One side effect of the invasion, was the ensuing influence. The late twenties and early thirties were a time of parody and mimicry. The Brazilian western, following the United States genre, became popular, often going as far as using English names for the characters. European film didn't go unnoticed either. The avant-guard films consisting of rapid cutting and dialectic montage became very influential for filmmakers like Mario Peixoto, whose film Limite set the standard of "the Brazilian experimental film." In 1930 at the age of nineteen, Peixoto made Limite but quickly pulled it from the screens. While this unusual action made it difficult for many people to see, one of those people was the great Soviet director Sergie Eisenstein. Eisenstein call the film "an extremely beautiful film which one should submit oneself to right from the very first moments, as to the agonizing chords of a synthetic and pure language of cinema." (p.309 BC) Three years later, Humberto Mauro would produce his masterpiece Ganga Bruta ("Brutal Gang"), which would later spark the Cinema Novo. Ganga Bruta, about a man that tries to continue his life after murdering his wife, relied heavily upon both G

Some common words found in the essay are:
Cinema Novo, Vera Cruz, Age Brazilian, Brazilian Cinema, FIB Brazilian, Rio Hollywood, Salles Gomes, Institutional Act, America European, Cinematograficas Azzurri, cinema novo, vera cruz, brazilian cinema, brazilian film, novo directors, social political, bela epoca, rio 40, dos santos, brazilian filmmakers, nelson pereira dos, texas press austin, university texas press, pereira dos santos, rio 40 graus,
Approximate Word count = 3748
Approximate Pages = 15 (250 words per page double spaced)