Play like a regular average movie and then after half an hour has passed weird things begin to pop without any explanation which made this movie idiotic all the But when I saw "Mar de Rosas" ("Sea of Roses") I was stunned and not in a good way because for a large portion of the film it all seem to It was funny, crazy and out of this world, specially When Ana Carolina made "Das Tripas Coração" I accepted its bizarrice, absurdity and abstract settings. My review was written in September 1980 after a Greenwich Village screening. Count Ana Carolina as a helmer to watch, with a great facility for handling actors, while giving them plenty of room for invention. Her transition to an adult career is problematical. Whether playing violent practical jokes or merely flaring her dangerous looking teeth, Pereira is an unforgettable young monster and an expert scene-stealer. Standing out in the well-chosen ensemble is young actress Christina Pereira as the "bad seed" daughter. Otavio Augusto, sort of a latin John Belushi, is an excellent, mainly deadpan foil for her. Norma Benguel as the mother gives an intense, riveting performance, all the more effective than just playing for laughs. Symbolic climax has trio fleeing on a train and the murderous daughter pushing her mother and Augusto off to ride on alone. Ensemble gabfest which ensues contains many highs and lows, but is kept lively by broad playing and explosive humor. Fast pace of the opening reels bogs down when the trio stop off in a small town and rest at the home of a dentist while Felicidade recuperates from nearly being hit by a bus. They soon team up with a friendly pursuer (Otavio Augusto) sent by the husband, who has seemingly survived the bloodletting. Film begins in a road movie format, with Felicidade (Norma Benguel) and her horrid adolescent daughter (Cristina Pereira) fleeing after her mom slashes her husband brutally with a razor blade during an argument in their motel room. Focusing on the bizarre and explosive behavior of her talented microcosmic cast, Carolina delivers a "comedy to offend everyone" what MGM's all-star "The Loved One" only promised. Shown as part of a two-day Public Cinema series of recent Brazilian films, Ana Carolina's 1977 pic, "Sea of Roses", is a devastating black comedy, attacking any and all institutions, including the family. "Mar de Rosas" is refreshingly anti-cliché, and its critical and commercial success paved the way to Ana Carolina's very individual oeuvre that combines anti- conformism, feminism and social criticism with a delightful touch of surrealistic (black) humor. "Mar de Rosas" has some major lulls (especially toward the end) and is technically precarious, but the acting is inspired and, despite being ultimately a tragic film, you'll find yourself cracking with the loony dialog which is rather difficult to translate, as Ana Carolina uses a lot of Brazilian jeux de mots, adages and figures of speech in her trademark style of "free association". Betinha and Felicidade are followed by suspicious character Bardi (Otávio Augusto) and, after terrible "accidents" - Betinha sets fire on her mother at a gas station, Felicidade is hit by a bus while trying to escape from Bardi - the 3 of them end up being "helped" by wacky couple Dirceu (Ary Fontoura) and Niobi (hilarious, wreck-voiced Myriam Muniz). She's on the run with her mother Felicidade (Norma Bengell, returning to Brazilian films after a long sojourn in European cinema and theater), who has killed husband Sergio (Hugo Carvana) in a hotel bathroom. A non-sequitur, iconoclast portrait of middle-class family life, her protagonist Betinha (Cristina Pereira, perfectly cast) is a sort of teenage Mafalda (Quino's comic book anti-heroine): rambunctious, naughty, irrepressible, eager to be evil. Ana Carolina surprised everybody when, after many documentary shorts and a hit documentary feature about Brazilian dictator Getúlio Vargas, she jumped into anarchist, surrealist crazy drama/black comedy with her first fiction film "Mar de Rosas".
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