This Brazilian film appears in the book 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die, I couldn't find a proper written review by critics, but it did get a positive rating, I was hoping for something worthwhile. Basically in the Northeast of Brazil, an impoverished family: the father Fabiano (Átila Iório), the mother Sinhá Vitória (Maria Ribeiro), and their two children and a dog called Baleia, wander the dry barren land, in search of better place for food, work and a home. They struggle to earn a living when they take a job for a wealthy rancher (Joffre Soares) overseeing the livestock, then they find an abandoned house which they move into. Their fortunes do begin to take an upward turn, but the father is duped into a card game with a crooked local policeman, soon an argument breaks out, and he ends up being beaten up by the cop. Despite being the victim of this injustice, the man believes in law in order, and makes no protest about the incident. Drought and misery force the man and his family to move on from the ranch and find elsewhere to earn their living. The film is very slow paced and has very little dialogue, the most memorable sequences are the family walking in the dry landscapes, I can't see it as the kind of film I would watch a second time, but I can see reasons why it is considered mentionable, all in all it is a fairly interesting drama. Worth watching, at least once!
Review of Barren Lives
