After an extended period directing original screenplays, dos Santos returned to the creative engagement with literature that was the wellspring of his early masterpieces, offering a combinatory adaptation of five stories by the renowned Brazilian novelist João Guimarães Rosa. Openly embracing a mode of magical realism, dos Santos' celebrated film tells the story of a farming family defined by the absence of its father who abruptly abandoned his wife and children, sailing away down the river, including his son who continues to communicate with his father, speaking daily to him from the river bank. While offering an evocative vision of rural Brazil as a timeless land of mystery and solemnity, The Third Bank of the River is also bitingly satiric in the remarkable depiction of religious belief when the family moves to the city and its youngest member, a mesmerizing little girl, is revealed to be a kind of saint, capable of miraculous acts. -Harvard Film Archive
The story of a poor woman living in the backwoods of Brazil and working as a maid. One day she is unfairly fired from the house where she was working and goes to the big city, facing a cruel and hostile world, working in factories, bars and bordellos.
Однажды слепой гитарист встречает группу воров и решает развлечь их занимательной историей. Он рассказывает о человеке, пришедшем с на северо-востока Бразилии и вступившим в банду преступников в Рио-де-Жанейро. Этот человек имел «закрытое тело», что значит, был неподвижен внешним воздействиям. Даже пули отскакивали от него. В рассказе гитариста фигурировал таинственный амулет Огума, древнего божества, которому поклонялись в Африке и Бразилии. Этот амулет защищал преступника от опасности и ранней смерти.
Augusto Matraga is a violent agressive farmer who, after being betrayed by his wife and trapped by several enemies, is bitten up and left for dead, being rescued by a couple of humble small farmers who nurse him for a long time until he is well again. Influenced by the couple, Matraga starts a long penitent life while waiting for his hour and chance to payback, starting a fight between his violent nature, his hidden desire of vengeance and the mysticism and goodness which is also part of him.
