Foreign Land: The Value of Film Noir

This review was published originally on cinekklesia on September 27, 2005.

A while ago, I had a brief conversation with a friend regarding the relative merits of pessimistic vs. optimistic portrayals in the arts. He argued that a prevailing view among his fellow graduate students favors darker, critical, and cynical views of the human condition, while he, on the other hand, has attempted to resist such dour visions by championing a more optimistic (or at least, balanced) perspective. It's like the old complaint about journalism: Why can't we hear some good news for a change?

I have to admit, however, that I tend to side with my friend's colleagues. Positive portrayals have a tendency to be cheesy and simplistic, and such sugar-coated optimism doesn't seem necessary (or even healthy) in our relatively well-to-do society. Pessimistic, even cynical, visions help us to become grounded in the reality of the human condition, reminding us of how far we have fallen and warning us of any delusions to the contrary.

That's why I loved Walter Salles' and Daniela Thomas' Foreign Land or Terra Estrangeira (1996), a Brazilian/Portuguese film noir that is both stylish and gritty. Paco (Fernando Alves Pinto) is a 21-year-old Brazilian college student with dreams of acting. Unfortunately, near the beginning of the movie, his mother passes away, right when the country is undergoing a financial crisis. Thus, he is left both emotionally distraught and materially destitute — the prototype of the starving, depressed artist.

Paco eventually meets Ígor (Luís Melo), an antiques dealer, who recruits him to deliver a violin to Portugal. Ígor is no ordinary antiques dealer, since the violin case not only carries a Stradivarius (worth a lot by itself) but also a handful of hot diamonds. Paco agrees to serve as a "mule" in this smuggling operation because (a) he needs the money and (b) he wants to get to Europe in order to visit San Sebastián, the region in Spain where his mother was from (and where she never had an opportunity to revisit prior to her death). For Paco, visiting San Sebastián would serve as a nice, albeit vicarious, bookend to his mother's life, thus providing him with needed closure. The plan is simple: Paco arrives in Lisbon, meets with his contact at the designated hotel, makes the transfer, gets his cash, and then catches a bus to Spain.

However, as film noir (or "neo-noir" as some critics would insist), Foreign Land cannot let Paco off so easily. He waits for days in his hotel because his contact never shows up, and he later discovers that said contact (another Brazilian expat who the audience meets early in the movie) was recently killed. Paco gets hold of an address that he hopes will lead him to someone who can get the violin off his hands, and he ends up meeting Alex (Fernanda Torres), his deceased contact's girlfriend and yet another Brazilian expat who is also somehow connected with Ígor's enterprise. New bad guys enter the scene, and the rest of the movie show Paco and Alex trying to get out of their rather uncomfortable situation.

So why did I like this movie so much? First, it utilizes well the aesthetic of film noir: black-and-white cinematography, haunting and mysterious shadows, and a gritty portrayal of desperate people—in this case, young Brazilians fleeing the economic hardships of home—caught in the clutches of a violent and opportunistic underworld. Alex is the wayward woman who seeks some form of escape and redemption, and while Paco is hardly the hard-boiled private eye of classic film noir, he's not exactly innocent — he did, after all, agree to Ígor's offer. Thus, Foreign Land follows the great tradition of such films as Double Indemnity, painting a bleak, perhaps nihilistic portrayal of the human condition — a Hobbesian vision of life as "nasty, brutish, and short." (By the way, if you happen to think that I know all of this stuff about film noir off the top of my head, then you think wrong. Check out my source on the subject.)

Yet, is this not too pessimistic? Despite its aesthetic allure, isn't film noir inaccurate? Life has its good moments too, doesn't it? To put a theological spin on it: We are fallen creatures, but we still bear at least a hint of God's image, do we not? True enough. However, the value of film noir lies in its palliative effect. All of us are aware of the prevalence of the "Hollywood Ending" in our cinematic fare, the practice of ensuring that whatever tragedies befall the stars, things nevertheless work out in the end. Film noir, by focusing on the opposite extreme and offering little to no hope, recalibrates our cinematic senses and brings us back to a healthier, more realistic view of our condition. Americans are too optimistic, after all, and a little bit of cynicism (at least one part cynic per twenty parts Pollyanna) is actually healthy.

Now some of you may argue that I am falling too easily into the elitist trap of my friend's grad school colleagues. Does not the intelligentsia require that its cultural artifacts have some value beyond "mere" entertainment? What about the man (or woman) on the street, who just wants to munch on some popcorn and escape for 90 minutes? That, however, is the beauty of film noir: It is escapism. The scenarios in film noir are extreme; rarely are people so dark and nihilistic. Those of us who have the luxury to watch movies probably are not living the lives depicted in such works as Foreign Land. Film noir allows us to play the part of observer, spying into alternate worlds that challenge our relatively comfortable lives but that nevertheless allow us to return to those lives. Therein lies film noir's genius: It is both critical and escapist. It has a little something for everyone.

Thus, I highly recommend Foreign Land, though keep in mind that it's not for kids (fair warning: there's a little bit of nudity and graphic sexuality near the end). It remains faithful to the film noir aesthetic and serves as a healthy antidote to our excessively chipper American culture. If you want to escape from the cacophony of optimists trying to provide us with "positive messages," then this movie is for you!