EIFF 2012: Girimunho

Girimunho opens out of the gloom and into light. Our indefatigable octogenarian protagonist, Bastú, goes on a similar journey.

The film begins with Bastú, matriarch of a simple home, becoming a widow when her boozehound husband passes away in his sleep. (You get the feeling that the tongue lashing she gave him before he turned in might have helped him on his trip down the styx.) Bastú takes it in her stride. Her body may fail her at times but her will to live life is unshakable. She shares the same punky, I’m old so I don’t give a fuck, air of Ruth Gordon in Harold and Maude. When a creditor comes looking to collect on her late husband’s debts she barely stirs from her hammock. “Who told him to do business with an 82-year-old man?” she says nonchalantly. When his ghost appears to be banging around in his old work shop her response is equally pragmatic: his belongings are scattered down river and she moves in her Singer sewing machine and excersise bike. Mood supersedes plot in this funny and moving film, which uses graceful compositions, a measured pace and conversational dialogue to immerse us in the rhythms of life of rural Brazil, its music and its easy going communities. “When cooking, best to do it slowly,” Bastú says to her bright-eyed granddaughter. Same goes for evocative meditations on life. [Jamie Dunn]