It might not have contributed much to Brazilian filmmaking in an artistic sense, but A Grande Família - O Filme has certainly done well for the box-office: the film premiered in first place on 262 screens, earning R$2.5 million (over 1 million USD) in its first weekend. This is the sixth biggest opening of a Brazilian film in the history of the country, which is welcome news for those who are hoping 2007 will be commercially healthier for national cinema than 2006.

It's no secret among my friends that I don't regret leaving New York City, where I once lived, but I do wish I could make a short trip back to see David Lynch's latest, INLAND EMPIRE. I'm pretty satisfied with arthouse and foreign distribution in São Paulo -- a small cluster of companies like Pandora, Europa, Califórnia, and Imagem bravely offer atypical titles, many of which earn only minimal commercial returns. Some movies are released shockingly quickly, like Grbavica, mere months after it won the Berlinale Golden Bear. Many French and Argentinean movies show up yet, as far as I know, never make it to U.S. cinemas. And it goes without saying that we see Brazilian films before anyone else. However, for a variety of reasons, some notable titles fall through the cracks. I'm still puzzled as to why Michel Gondry's The Science of Sleep shows no signs of making it to Brazil, not even for a festival screening.

Most American films we can rest assured will arrive after a comfortable wait, but considering Lynch's self-distribution strategy for INLAND EMPIRE, I'm anxious about when São Paulo will get a glimpse. How will this film be distributed internationally? I expect something will be worked out for European markets (if it hasn't already) but I hope Lynch's South American fans won't be kept waiting another year or two to see his work on the big screen. I'm already dying of curiosity and Manohla Dargis' passionate review hasn't helped my patience.

Bad news: according to FilmeB and the Folha de São Paulo, the Brazilian box office from January to October 2006 dropped 7% compared to the same period last year. Why? Competition from home entertainment and piracy is an obvious factor, plus the severe lack of theaters in Brazil (but that's nothing new). Considering the fact that the box office here is almost entirely dependent on U.S. films for its revenue, and that very few blockbusters came out of Hollywood this year, things start to make a little more sense.

Forecasters are more optimistic for next year for the same reasons as Americans, namely because of all the sequels to some of the most successful movie franchises in history (Shrek, Harry Potter, Pirates of the Caribbean, and Spider-Man). But I'm more interested in what Brazilian films can do for the local box office. 2006 was disappointing because only two national films managed over one million spectators: Se Eu Fosse Você (a rather unoriginal comedy starring two famous tv actors) with 3.6 million, and Didi - O Caçador de Tesouros (a children's movie) with 1.1 million. (In 2005, 2 Filhos de Francisco broke records with 5.3 million spectators, and in 2003 Carandiru had 4.6 million.) Some of the big hopes cited for next year are A Grande Família, Antônia (which recently won an audience-voted distribution award at the Mostra), Caixa Dois, Cidade dos Homens, O Magnata, El Pasado, and Saneamento Básico - O Filme. All of these have big names involved and have the chance to draw big audiences (three are based on successful tv series), but they will need to appeal to the lower economic classes if they hope to break a million spectators. Appealing to the masses is a big enough challenge, but considering Brazil's widely distributed population and the fact that 90% of people don't have access to a movie theater, selling tickets here (especially for non-Hollywood films) is a particularly daunting task.

In my coverage of FIICAV, I discussed the incentive laws that allow private companies to use a percentage of their tax money to finance national films. It therefore makes sense that Brazil's largest company, the oil giant Petrobrás, is also the largest funder of the arts and the single most important investor in Brazilian cinema. The company recently announced the details of its yearly Programa Petrobrás Cultural (PCC), which will launch its next phase in November with total funding increasing by 33% to R$80 million (US$36.59 million*). Petrobrás' profits have gone up and that means there is more money available for the arts.

This extra cash won't necessarily make it to film productions, as the PPC will be expanding beyond its traditional sectors to dance and theater companies, literature, and art-education. However, small- and mid-scale film festivals will now be eligible for public funding, in addition to the larger festivals (such as Festival do Rio, Mostra de São Paulo, Gramado Film Festival, and Brasília Film Festival) that are already funded by the PPC. As for the highly competitive slots for production funding, 26 films will share an investment of R$3.5 million (US$1.60 million*) and almost all of them will be independently distributed.

*using the current exchange rate of US$1 = R$2.1862

It's been awhile, but the Dispatch From Brazil is back! Check out my article I wrote for indieWIRE, "One Question, Many Different Answers - FIICAV Asks About the Future of the Brazilian Film Market".

An interesting point made at the "Brazilian Blockbusters" panel today at the FIICAV was that many of the most successful Brazilian movies in the national market have been biographies, eg, Cazuza - O Tempo Não Pára, 2 Filhos de Francisco, Zuzu Angel, Olga, and Vinícius. Director Breno Silveira (2 Filhos de Francisco) suggested that the Brazilian public is in serious need of its own heroes, and producer Rita Buzzar (Olga) said that audiences strongly identify with characters that are based on facts and the Brazilian reality. This echoes the idea that what filmmakers from an emerging market with limited resources can do better than anyone else is tell stories about themselves.

I've heard some comments that the trend of history-lite films "based on" the lives of real people indicates a crisis in fiction. On the one hand, Brazilian biographical movies are important vehicles for reflecting on national identity, but on the other hand, we still need fiction that takes a risk on creating characters that are equally as memorable.