When director Walter Salles got up on stage to accept the Oscar win for his 2024 biopic, I’m Still Here, he did not begin by thanking his mother, or father, or God, or even his wife. He said, “Thank you, first, in the name of Brazilian cinema.”
Before he got on stage, we were reminded by the warmth of Nick Offerman’s omnipresent announcer voice: this was the first Oscar win for Brazil. It was not, however, the first time that Salles was at the Oscars. He had been nominated for Best International Film (then called “Best Foreign Film”) once before with the 1998 road movie: Central Station. But not it, nor The Motorcycle Diaries (2004), nor even my personal favourite, City of God (2002), had ever secured Salles an Academy victory.
He, and Brazil, finally had it. The ball was in their field, and for once, we’re not talking about football. But given I’m Still Here‘s widespread audience and critical acclaim, could it have had more?
This year’s award allocations were jumbled, haphazard and erratic. The dolling out of votes went from one film to the other, then back again. Although Anora won in five categories, who could have known, say, that the acting victories would span across four pictures (Anora, The Brutalist, A Real Pain, and Emelia Pérez)? It was a complete mishmash, as if the voters at the Academy were toddlers handed a paintbrush and told to go wild. Probably not far off from the truth.
I say we need to reign them in. We need more discipline – more focus. Could that focus have been on I’m Still Here?
Giving Fernanda Torres “Best Actress” would have been the obvious start. She already won at the Golden Globes. Never over the span of two hours and fifteen minutes have so many emotions (more than I, as a man, thought possible) been conveyed in one face. Her character, a portrayal of the real-life activist Eunice Paiva (with whose family Walter Salles was familiar as a child), begins content and dignified, but firm and decided. This firmness is only brought – forced – out of her as the film progresses, by Brazil’s authoritarian military government. She holds steady, and you can see in those eyes the weight of her husband, her family, that sombre 1970s moment for Brazil. She rarely breaks, but when she does, we feel it. The short outbursts – such as when she berates the police who have been following the family, or when she cries together with her daughter Eliana – prove the most powerful. The burden of repression is captured, trapped, in her eyes, right until the end, and then: relief.
It would have been a no-brainer “Best Actress” choice. After all, Karla Sofía Gascón was already struck off the list for her Twitter remarks. Cynthia Erivo’s performance was fun, but nothing special. Anora did not need five awards, so we can take one away – sorry Mikey. That leaves Torres’ only competition Demi Moore, in The Substance. Sure, Moore did well, playing both dignity and degradation elegantly. But she could not match the range of Torres.
So, was there a Hollywood conspiracy to keep foreign films down? Was Torres robbed in the pursuit of USA superiority? It is more likely that no one quite knew what to vote for this year, because most of the films were mediocre. I mean, even if we hand Torres the trophy and I’m Still Here goes from one to two wins, does that change much? The best international movie this year, a stellar main actress performance, but was it spectacular enough to win anything more?
“Walter Salles, Selton Mello, Fernanda Torres at the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival” by Adam Chitayat is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.