On Location peels again the curtain on some of your favourite movies, tv reveals, and extra. This time, we check out The Secret Agent.
If you solely noticed a couple of sun-streaked stills from Kleber Mendonça Filho’s new movie “Secret Agent”, set largely in the Northeastern Brazilian city of Recife—during a confetti-covered week of Carnival, in 1977 no less—it might seem like a charming opportunity for escapism. In reality, the political thriller follows a man desperately plotting his own escape from the threats of Brazil’s two-decades-long military dictatorship, the tentacles of which have wrapped themselves around every element of daily life. Here, the joyous and the boisterous contrast the dark and insidious, allowing viewers to both be delighted by colorful street scenes and celebrations while the rot of fear creeps in, as the details surrounding our main character (Wagner Moura) and his predicament are revealed.
For Mendonça, the film was a chance to return to his hometown of Recife, and paint a portrait of a city full of contrasts, using everything from historic movie theaters to popular waterfront parks in the sultry hours after sunset to tell a story that has already garnered four Oscar nods. To get a sense of how Mendonça time-traveled through Brazil past and present, while drawing on references very close to home, we hopped on the phone with the director himself. Below, he walked us through the very real places that shaped the film and its unmistakable visual identity.
First issues first: Was the movie shot solely on location in Recife, Brazil?
We shot 90% in Recife, which is the place I come from, and so I do know the metropolis very properly. It’s a powerful character for a movie. I even wrote the scenes to be shot very particularly in places that I do know by coronary heart.
We additionally traveled to Brasilia, and we did two days in São Paulo as a result of I needed the places to be very particular. Of course in cinema, you’ll be able to all the time shoot in some again road and name it São Paulo, however I actually needed to point out the distinction in the model of the three cities, even when they solely appeared briefly in the movie.
And then when Armando talks to his lawyer in Brasilia, I needed to truly have a second the place the lawyer goes downstairs and finds a payphone, and you may inform that it is Brasilia as a result of of the structure. We discovered a beautiful location proper at what they name the industrial sector in Brasilia, which was principally in-built the late ‘60s and early ’70s. And there was a really explicit shot with the postman, who’s bringing the telegram, and that was very particularly Brasilia.