Behind the Sun (film)

Infobox Film
name = Behind the Sun
(Abril Despedaçado)


caption = original film poster
director = Walter Salles
producer = Arthur Cohn
writer = Ismail Kadare (novel)
Karim Ainouz
Sérgio Machado
Walter Salles
João Moreira Salles
Daniela Thomas
starring = Rodrigo Santoro
José Dumont
Rita Assemany
Othon Bastos
Wagner Moura
Vinícius de Oliveira
Ravi Ramos Lacerda
Luiz Carlos Vasconcelos
music = Ed Cortês
Antonio Pinto
Beto Villares
editing = Isabelle Rathery
distributor = Buena Vista International
Miramax (US)
released = 12 December, 2001 (US)
1 May, 2002 (Brazil)
runtime = 105 min
country = Brazil
language = Portuguese
budget = $4 million
imdb_id = 0291003|

"Behind the Sun" (Portuguese title: "Abril Despedaçado") is a Golden Globe-nominated 2001 Brazilian film directed by Walter Salles, produced by Arthur Cohn, starring Rodrigo Santoro. Its original Portuguese title means "Shattered April", and it is based on the novel of that name by Ismail Kadare, about the honor culture in the remote areas of Brazil.

Plot summary

The year is 1910; the place the badlands of Northeast Brazil. Twenty-year-old Tonio is the middle son of an impoverished farm family, the Breves. He is next in line to kill and then die in an ongoing blood feud with a neighboring clan, the Ferreiras. For generations, the two families have quarreled over land. Now they are locked into a series of tit-for-tat assassinations of their sons; an eye-for-an-eye, a tooth-for-a-tooth. Embedded in this choreography of death is a particular code of ethics: "Blood has the same volume for everyone. You have no right to take more blood than was taken from you." Life is suffused with a sense of futility and stoic despair.

Under pressure from his father, Tonio kills one of the Ferreira sons to avenge the murder of his older brother. This act marks him as the next victim. Tonio's younger brother is addressed only as "the Kid" by the family. Anticipating future loss, his parents don't give him a name. The Kid is an imaginative and loving child, whose spirit will not break in the face of harsh parenting, brutalizing isolation, and numbing poverty. The Kid's love encourages Tonio to question his fate. When Tonio meets Clara, a charming itinerant circus girl, all of life's possibilities open up for him. Will he be able to escape? Can the cycle of human sacrifice be broken?

Main cast

*José Dumont as the father
*Rodrigo Santoro as Tonho, the eldest son
*Rita Assemany as the Mother
*Ravi Ramos Lacerda as Pacu
*Luiz Carlos Vasconcelos as Salustiano
*Flávia Marco Antonio as Clara
*Everaldo Pontes as Old Blind Man
*Caio Junqueira as Inácio
*Mariana Loureiro as Widow
*Servilio De Holanda as Isaías
*Wagner Moura as Matheus
*Othon Bastos as Mr. Lourenço
*Gero Camilo as Reginaldo
*Vinícius de Oliveira as Ferreira Family Member

Awards and nominations

BAFTA Film Awards
*Best Film Not in the English Language – Arthur Cohn and Walter Salles (nominated)

Golden Globe Awards
*Best Foreign Language Film (nominated)

Havana Film Festival
*Best Director – Walter Salles (won)
*House of the Americas Award – Walter Salles (won)

Venice Film Festival
*Little Golden Lion – Arthur Cohn and Walter Salles (won)
*Golden Lion – Walter Salles (nominated)

Quotations

"Have you ever known what is love? No, you haven't. And you won't. Can you hear the ticking of this clock? It always says 'one-more, one-more, one-more'; but now it is different. To you, it says 'one-less, one-less, one-less'...".

External links

*imdb title | id=0291003| title= Abril Despedaçado
* [http://www.abrildespedacado.com.br/ Official site (English, French and Portuguese)]
* [http://www.miramaxhighlights.com/behindthesun/index.html Official US site by Miramax]