A brave, if not completely paint-by-numbers, look at the
squalor and crushing poverty of a slum in Brazil, Annie Eastman's Bay of All Saints features a story that
has been told countless times before.
The big difference between those films and this one: reality.
Bay of All Saints
follows three women who live in a makeshift shack on stilts in the middle of a
bay so polluted that it eventually makes up much of the land that surrounds
them. The film dissects their
constant struggle to merely survive as they live each day for the moment,
uncertain of their future
Audiences will surely enjoy the contrasting personalities of
our three leading women. Geni, an
incredibly brash and authoritative figure, must deal directly with the
Brazilian government in order to get her neighbors out of the palafitas. Jesus, another strong woman, is
extremely irresponsible when it comes to the general welfare of her newborn
grandson. And then we have Dona
Maria, a woman who grew up as a slave.
She only knows suffering and must contend with a granddaughter who has
disappeared.
Director Annie Eastman earns major praise for taking footage
from a six-year period and condensing it down to a 75-minute feature. While the
wide range of time doesn't evolve into much change within the living conditions
of our lead subjects, these women aren't giving up without a fight. They become crusaders against the local
government, refusing to watch the Brazilian government consistently go back on
their word. The tactic is hard to
stomach, but it does bring about a raw authenticity that makes Bay of All Saints worth seeing. It is sad and depressing, but the
central story is one that yearns to be heard.
