guisreis Review of O Amuleto de Ogum

O Amuleto de Ogum (1974)

Protected by the Orisha in a film with many overlapping genres

[8/10 · 10 November 2020]

Very interesting movie by master director Nelson Pereira dos Santos, which overlaps different genres and issues. It is a gangster film, with scenes that remind Westerns too, but it is also a movie on Northeastern migration to Southeast (what ia a quite important social issue in Brazil), violence in big towns, lives outside touristic areas in Rio de Janeiro, and obviously African Brazilian culture and religion. It is also a film in the border of fantasy and fantastic realism: the idea of a "closed body", there is, a person protected by the Orishas from any harm, is the core subject in the whole film. The opening scene with a blind storyteller telling his offending robbers what would be the movie story was also a quite smart way to begin...