**/****
screenplay by L.G. Bayão
directed by Vincente Amorim
by Bill Chambers There is a whole subtext, nay, context begging to be unpacked in Motorrad, yet the filmmaking never inspires much curiosity about it, and it’s all too easy to substitute the legacy of George Miller’s Mad Max movies for table-setting. Shaggy Hugo (Guilherme Prates) breaks into a seemingly-abandoned garage and sees a carburetor he would like. The proprietor chases him with a shotgun, but an alluring, tomboyish woman (Carla Salle) intervenes, like the farmer’s daughter convincing daddy not to shoot the stranger climbing out her bedroom window. Instead, they brand Hugo, which is curiously obfuscated by elliptical cutting for how meaningful it becomes later on. Hugo rushes off to install his new carburetor and meet up with older brother Ricardo (Emílio de Mello), the leader of a makeshift motorcycle gang that seems pretty wholesome, even though they act like having someone slightly younger in Hugo tag along is cramping their style. At the same time, they seem like people at once liberated from the shackles of society and bound by the rules of a new world order forcing Man out onto the open road, and so their joy-riding inspires a certain amount of dread even before bikers in identity-obscuring masks show up to turn Motorrad into The Hills Have Eyes. Still, I know of at least one individual inured to the slow-burn of slasher cinema who gave up on it well before the machetes were drawn, and I can’t say I really blame him. Our heroes are all sandy blondes whose names are their defining traits–only puppyish Vincent, the “farmer’s daughter” (who resurfaces on the trail, possibly as bait), and the token girlfriend in the gang (Juliana Lohmann) inspire a measure of attachment, by virtue of sticking out like sore thumbs physically. That the killers are equally albeit literally faceless suggests commentary of a sort, but also a deep cynicism; the violence in the film is vicious because it has to be to make an impact. But stunt coordinator Javier Lambert, an old pro who got his start on Licence to Kill, devises some white-knuckle motorcycle chases, and director Vicente Amorim deserves credit for both capturing a Brazil unfamiliar to filmgoers (Kubrick-like, he finds the wasteland in his notoriously verdant backyard) and rushing headlong towards an existential finish, even if it feels like he just ran out of gas. Programme: Contemporary World Cinema
