On 17 May 1931, the young director Mário Peixoto released his masterpiece "Limite" in a premiere in Capitólio Theater in Rio de Janeiro to astonished audiences bewildered by the impressive and poetic images. Considered by many viewers the best Brazilian movie ever made, this feature has never been released commercially. However, in a great paradox, Mário Peixoto has never made any other movie. The director Sérgio Machado pays a great tribute to the life and work Mário Peixoto a.k.a. Maçarico by his close friends with this documentary, using his diary; footages of "Limite", the never concluded "Onde a Terra Acaba" (1933) and the short "O Homem do Morcego" (1980); and interesting testimonies of Olga Breno, Ruy Solberg, Nelson Pereira dos Santos and Walter Salles among others.
An astonishing creation, Limite is the only feature by the Brazilian director and author Mário Peixoto, made when he was just 22 years old. Inspired by a haunting André Kertész photograph on the cover of a French magazine, this avant-garde silent masterpiece centres on a man and two women lost at sea, their pasts unfolding through flashbacks propelled by the music of Erik Satie, Claude Debussy, Igor Stravinsky, and others. An early work of independent South American filmmaking, Limite was famously difficult to see for most of the twentieth century. It is a pioneering achievement that continues to captivate with its timeless visual poetry.
