The latter of those is, for my money, the best of a pretty stellar crop of nominees in the category. Interestingly, it’s the second film from Brazil in as many years to be up for best picture, following on from Walter Salles's I'm Still Here last time out. And that’s not the only similarity between the pair.
The fourth narrative feature from writer/director Kleber Mendonça Filho, the gripping, stylish, and at times endearingly offbeat film is built around a quietly staggering performance from Wagner Moura, who is quite rightly up for best actor. Moura plays Armando, a university professor with an initially unclear past on the run for reasons that are gradually and deftly unspooled over a luxurious 2 hour 40 minute run-time that never comes close to dragging.
From the tense opening sequence set at a petrol station – where a lone dead body lies ominously on the ground – to a riveting climatic chase scene with a memorable instrumental score, the film is dripping with atmosphere and local character. Crucially, Mendonça Filho manages to convey the terrors of the dictatorship and the insidious evils of a corrupt society while also expressing a clear affection for Recife of the time and its ordinary residents, a nostalgia that could earlier be glimpsed in his 2023 documentary Pictures of Ghosts.
Throughout, the film is truly alive to the possibilities of cinema – and it’s no coincidence that Armando’s father-in-law is employed as the projectionist at a local picture house, where young Fernando has become entranced by the poster for Jaws.
This aspect of the film is further driven home by a smart framing device that sees a modern day student learning about the activities of Moura's character through audio recordings and newspaper archives, building up to an affecting coda.
View Green Video on the source websiteIt’s the combination of these factors – the political and personal relevancy, the textured sense of time and place, the tremendous character work, the sheer thrilling cinematic verve of it all – that would make The Secret Agent such a deserving Oscar winner. It truly stands apart from the rest of the pack.
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