Breno Mello

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Breno Mello (born September 7, 1931 in Porto Alegre , Rio Grande do Sul , † July 11, 2008 ibid) was a Brazilian actor and football player . He gained fame primarily through his first film role in Marcel Camus ' feature film Orfeu Negro (1959).

Life

Career as a football player and film debut

Breno Mello was born in Porto Alegre in 1931, where he grew up in poverty. As a child he helped his mother sell chickens and left elementary school early. Mello later aspired to a career in Brazilian club football. After starting at São José in Porto Alegre, he played at Gremio Esportivo Renner . The team won the 1954 state championship in Rio Grande do Sul . Three years later he came to Rio de Janeiro at the invitation of the Fluminense club , where he was unable to establish himself as a player.

Mello together with Marpessa Dawn on a film poster by Helmuth Ellgaard

Three years later, the attractive, slim Mello was discovered in Rio's streets by Marcel Camus for the film. The French director, fascinated by the perfect appearance of the Brazilian, was preparing his feature film Orfeu Negro (1959) at this time . In this, Camus took up the ancient legend of Orpheus and Eurydice and transferred the myth to the Rio de Janeiro of the present, at the time of the annual carnival festivities. Mello, who at the time did not speak a word of French and was also barely able to write in his own mother tongue, prevailed over 300 competitors during the audition. Then he took on the title role in Orfeu Negro of the young tram driver Orpheus, who met the strange girl Eurydike (played by Marpessa Dawn ) during a business trip . Both spend an intoxicating night together in the frenzy of the carnival. However, the young couple's love ends in tragedy. “Marcel Camus taught me how to play. He was very gentle and the filming was great. He was very patient, ” Mello said decades later about the collaboration.

Orfeu Negro developed into an international success with audiences and critics. The film, created in the style of neorealism and relying entirely on a cast of colored amateur actors, won the Golden Palm at the Cannes Film Festival in 1959 , and the Oscar for best foreign language film a year later . The music of Luiz Bonfá and Antônio Carlos Jobim , who are among the most famous composers of Afro-Brazilian samba , contributed to the success . On the other hand, Mello's acting performance was received less positively by the trade press. In his feature film debut, the amateur actor shows himself as a handsome, male Orpheus, but interprets the character more as a dancer than as an actor and cannot convince, according to the American critic Bosley Crowther ( New York Times ). The film met with sustained criticism in Mello's homeland for exoticizing Brazil as an "endless dance party populated by hot-blooded Latino caricatures" .

Descent and death

After Orfeu Negro , Mello only briefly pursued his career as a football player, which should lead him to FC Santos , where he shared the bank with the young Pelé . Thanks to the film, he became known to a wide audience, and from the early 1960s he tried to gain a foothold as an actor in Brazilian cinema. By the end of the 1980s, however, only a handful of films followed and Mello's acting career ended in 1988 with the crime film Ronald Biggs - Caught in Rio .

Breno Mello was married twice and has five children. He lived with his first wife in Novo Hamburgo and with his second wife in Florianópolis . Both marriages ended in divorce. Mello later moved back to his hometown. According to his son Paulo, his financial reserves were used up by gambling addiction. Mello later earned his living by changing professions such as actor in television commercials, soccer coach, driver and simple worker. One of his last jobs was selling advertisements for a newspaper. “Brazilian cinema wasn't rich. I couldn't make a living from my roles ... ” , said Mello in 2005.

After his retirement, Mello lived on the state minimum pension (150 euros per month) alone in a poor district called Tristeza (English "sadness") in Porto Alegre. In 2004 he was tracked down by the two filmmakers René Letzgus and Bernard Tournois, who were able to win him over as a contemporary witness for À la recherche d'Orfeu Negro . The documentary analyzed the influence of Marcel Camus' film on today's Brazil and its musical landscape. The ARTE production was shown in the presence of Mello, his former teammate Pelé and the then Brazilian Minister of Culture Gilberto Gil at the 58th Cannes Film Festival in 2005, where all three were made honorary citizens of the French city. The Brazilian government paid for Mello's trip to France.

In 2008 Mello died lonely and impoverished at the age of 76 from a heart attack in Tristeza, Porto Alegre. His body was not found by family members and neighbors until two days later. At the time of death, he had been working on his autobiography. He found his final resting place in the João XXIII cemetery . Marpessa Dawn , his screen partner from Orfeu Negro, died just six weeks later .

A Descoberta de Orfeu (Eng. "The Discovery of Orfeu") is currently being prepared, another documentary film about Mello's life story. The two filmmakers Rene Goya Filho and Alexandre Derlam had collected ten hours of video material before the actor's death. A first teaser was shown at the Gramado Film Festival in early August 2008 .

Filmography

  • 1959: Orfeu Negro
  • 1963: Rata de puerto
  • 1963: Os Vencidos
  • 1964: O Santo Módico
  • 1973: O Negrinho do Pastoreio
  • 1988: Ronald Biggs - Caught in Rio ( Prisoner of Rio )

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c cf. AFP : Mort de Breno Mello, vedette d '"Orfeu Negro" ( Memento from July 1, 2012 in the web archive archive.today ) at google.com, July 12, 2008 (accessed on January 1, 2011)
  2. ↑ a b c d e f cf. Cavalheiro, Rodrigo: Obituario: La triste muerte del 'Orfeo Negro' at elpais.com, July 18, 2008 (accessed on January 1, 2010)
  3. ↑ cf. Morre Breno Mello, o Orfeu Negro at zerohora.clicrbs.com.br, July 12, 2008 (accessed January 2, 2009)
  4. ↑ a b c d cf. Lopez, Virginia: Obituario: Breno Mello . In: El Mundo , July 20, 2008, p. 8
  5. ↑ a b c cf. Mayo, Francia (AFP): Breno Mello vuelve a Cannes 46 años después . May 17, 2005, 6:25 PM GMT (accessed January 1, 2010 via LexisNexis Economy )
  6. ↑ a b cf. Hamid, Rahul: Orfeu Negro . In: Schneider, Steven Jay (ed.): 1001 films: the best films of all time . Hombrechtikon / Zurich: Ed. Olms, 2005. - ISBN 3-283-00525-7 . P. 366
  7. ↑ cf. Movie review by Bosley Crowther in The New York Times, December 22, 1959
  8. ↑ Mort de Breno Mello, vedette d '"Orfeu Negro" ( Memento of the original from June 26, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.aujourdhui.ma
  9. ↑ cf. Mayo, Francia ( AFP ): Pelé reencuentra en Cannes al heroe de "Orfeo Negro" . May 16, 2005, 5:51 PM GMT (accessed January 1, 2010 via LexisNexis Economy )
  10. ↑ cf. A Descoberta de Orfeu in the Internet Movie Database (accessed January 1, 2010)
  11. ↑ cf. Film profile ( Memento of the original from April 12, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. at okna.com.br (accessed on January 2, 2009) @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.okna.com.br
  12. ↑ cf. Breno Mello é tema de documentário at festivaldegramado.net, August 12, 2008 (accessed January 2, 2009)
personal data
SURNAME Mello, Breno
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Brazilian soccer player and actor
DATE OF BIRTH September 7, 1931
PLACE OF BIRTH Porto Alegre , Rio Grande do Sul
DATE OF DEATH July 11, 2008
Place of death Porto Alegre , Rio Grande do Sul