FROM THE CENTRO POPULAR DE CULTURA TO GLOBO REPORTER: THE CENTRALITY OF THE NORTHEAST IN THE FILMMAKING OF EDUARDO COUTINHO (1962-1978)
Eduardo Coutinho; Filmmaking; Documentary Reportage; Northeast; Sertão.
This dissertation investigates the centrality of the Northeast, particularly the northeastern sertao, in the cinematic production of filmmaker Eduardo de Oliveira Coutinho (1933-2014), focusing the analysis on the period of his involvement with the Centro Popular de Cultura and Globo Reporter (1962-1979). Initially, I situate the filmmaker within the context of the engaged art spaces of the 1960s and his initial contact with the Northeast. In the second and third sections, I explore how the northeastern sertao became a central spatiality for his formation and representation of the sertanejo. Marking his movements throughout the region, I conceptually work with the categories of space and place as proposed by Yi-Fu Tuan (2013), and with a social conception of sertao formulated by Candice Vital e Souza (2015). Methodologically, I analyze the representations of the sertao in the fictional feature film Faustao (1970), using the classical narrative and film segmentation proposed by David Bordwell (2005, 2013), as well as the narrator concept developed by Ismail Xavier (2019). When analyzing the documentary reports Seis dias de Ouricuri (1976), O pistoleiro de Serra Talhada (1977), Theodorico, o imperador do sertao (1978), and Exu, uma tragedia sertaneja (1979), I engage with the category of voice and the expository, observational, and participatory modes proposed by Bill Nichols (2005, 2016), aiming to understand the different sertanejo voices activated by Eduardo Coutinho.