The militancy of the form in Cabra marcado para morrer: distance, meta-reflexive device and construction of reality as strategies of the second phase of Eduardo Coutinho’s documentary

Abstract

The work consists of an analysis of the formal strategies of Eduardo Coutinho in the documentary Cabra marcado para morrer (1984). These strategies marked the second phase of the filmmaker's career. In the period, Coutinho denied the militant bias of youth and the television conventions, in a search for the conditions of production of truth and for the super-verité of the interviewees (Jean Rouch). In short, this was done, among other strategies, from the Brechtian distance (presence of the team and the technical apparatus in the picture), a meta-reflexive device (reflexive narration and anti-normalizing, for example), continuous filming and Construction of reality through the creation of unnatural facts.