The Brazilian-French documentary film Ressaca by Patrizia Landi and Vincent Rimbaux was awarded this morning with the 2020 International Emmy Award in the Arts Programming competition. The moving film documents the South American country’s financial crisis through the story of the Teatro Municipal, Rio de Janeiro’s famed opera house.
After years of growth and hope, Brazil collapsed. From 2009, the year when Rio de Janeiro won the dispute to host the Olympics, to 2017, chaos replaced the prospect of a glorious future. The last 15 years have been marked by the expectations that the big events would be the peak of Brazil’s economic growth and bring international recognition as a world power, but it has never happened. Ten days after the end of the games, the country saw the former president Dilma Roussef undergo an impeachment process and since then, there has been a major political and economic crisis, the worst the country has seen since the dictatorship period.
All regions have felt the impact, especially Rio. The city, which is a global reference, is bankrupt. Shot in black and white, Ressaca chooses as its characters the artists and public employees of the Municipal Theater to show the dark side of a city in contradiction with its clichés. The jewel of the nation’s opera scene is on the brink of collapse: the state is bankrupt and can no longer pay the employees’ salaries. The workers resist with all their might to try and save the theatre.
The film is available to stream for free through November 30 at www.babel-studios.com/docs#/ressaca
