Entranced Earth (Terra em Transe) - (Mr Bongo Films) (1967) [DVD]

Like any South American nation of the 60s, the fictional El Dorado is a land yearning for genuine reforms. Unfortunately it is beset by a chimera composed of religious fanaticism, crass nationalism and an indifferent educated class. Paolo Martins (Jardel Filho) is a poet, a former supporter of senator Porfirio Diaz (Paolo Autran), a right-wing religious fundamentalist. However through his contact with Sara, a communist, Paolo changes his political convictions and swerves towards Felipe Viera (Jose Lewgoy), a liberal governor who is the country's sole bulwark against totalitarianism. Politics in Eldorado becomes enmeshed in the purview of the media and business class, giving way to an internecine arena scattered with violence and paper thin loyalties.

Entranced Earth displays the grandiloquent visual expression of Glauber Rocha s folk westerns (Black God White Devil, Antonio das Mortes) but its sober current provides an acute and lucid glimpse of a political system in crisis. Made in 1967, Entranced Earth ranks amongst the great classics of political cinema such as Gillo Pontecorvo's The Battle of Algiers and Costa-Gavras' Z.