Meteoro: A Political Parable

CRITIQUE / CINEMA
FABLE AND REALITY

Meteor is not a disaster movie, but a production with political overtones made in partnership by Brazil, Puerto Rico, and Venezuela. Directed by Puerto Rican Diego de la Texera, the film starts from a true event that occurred in Brazil to build a parable about the fate of an isolated community.

The plot refers to the early 1960s, when the government attempted to connect Brasília to every corner of the country. On the border between Bahia and Piauí, the construction of the BR-020 highway stopped due to problematic terrain and the 1964 military coup. From the workers who remained there waiting for a resolution, the village of Nova Holanda was born — which in the film is named Meteor.

In the fiction, the community must become the master of its own destiny, establishing rules of coexistence that move toward anarchism, where there is no government, money, or private property. It is necessary to rediscover morality and sexuality, even counting on the supernatural help of a meteorite that reveals a vital water source.

The title is metaphorical: the city has a meteoric existence, emerging from nothing and shining for its uniqueness, but condemned by isolation. The anarchist experience of Meteor is presented as something 'too similar to communism' to survive contact with the outside world, which is hierarchical and marked by pre-determined rules.

Although the conclusion points to the unfeasibility of this process in the real world, the film allows for a humorous glimpse of how the world could — or should — be.