First time I saw Capoeira when was watching the Only The Strong movie with Mark Dacascos. Couldn’t imagine that 17 years later I will see it again but as an original Brazilian film. Probably filmmakers from all over the world in searching for new ideas of martial arts movies sometime can reveal a really good original script and fighting art, show us something new like Indonesian movie Merantau made in perfect action style as good as Ong Bak 3 The Movie, and now Besouro.
Besouro (Beetle) is one of the biggest productions in the history of Brazilian cinema, sets in 1920s Bahia, the story of a legendary capoeira fighter who uses the power of Candomble to fight the harsh conditions which, even post-abolition, the black population endured in Brazil.
Besouro is not typical hero as we accustomed to see on the screen, he is provoking, arrogant and cocky guy who doesn’t want to be an example of generosity. And probably only the evil spirit can show his mistakes and the right way. As a cocky guy Besouro betrays his friend, gets his girlfriend and eventually leaves the village and later only communing with the gods, he hones his skills to levels unknown to his peers, and leads a battle of the poor against the powerful.
Action director Huan-Chiu Ku (Kill Bill, Matrix) made a spectacular stunt sequences mixed a fusion of dance and martial arts with wire-fu like in True Legend Movie. Besouro is the first feature film from director Joao Daniel Tikhomiroff, who previously established himself directing television commercials. I liked cinematography work by Enrique Chediak, who used to work on 28 Days Later, Turistas and Repo Man.
Besouro is a nice art-house martial arts Western.
