PROPRIEDADE (PROPERTY)
by Rose Finlay
Daniel Bandeira, Brazil 2022
A victim of a hostage situation, Teresa (Malu Galli) has lived her life ever since in isolation in her townhouse. When her husband Roberto (Tavinho Teixeira) and daughter convince her to leave for their countryside estate to recuperate, she agrees with much anxiety. Roberto has fitted out the car to become an armored vehicle to make her feel more secure. When they arrive at the estate, a situation erupts. Roberto has dismissed the farm workers, who have been exploited for years, as he plans to sell the property. The farm hands occupy the house at gunpoint and quickly events unfold where Teresa finds herself trapped in the armored car with no means of escape.
PROPRIEDADE is a suffocating and unnerving thriller which highlights the extreme differences between the social classes in Brazil. It is a film entirely within the moral greyness of inequality. Teresa is a deeply traumatized woman, whose life is consumed by fear due to being held at gunpoint. However, she is also a part of a wealthy, dominating class and lives a life of material comfort at the expense of the workers in her family’s employment. She is metaphorically trapped just as she is physically trapped in an armored car for much of the film. The car represents her wealth and privilege, and despite this, she is still a broken person and it doesn’t save her from having to deal with the consequences of how her family gains and retains its wealth. The farm workers are the other side of the coin, poor, uneducated, and poorly treated, they come off in much of the film as a mindless, violent mass. However, as the film progresses, we learn of how they’ve been injured, poisoned, and underpaid. If they are violent, it is merely a reflection of the violence inflicted on them by Teresa, Roberto, and society as a whole. There is no room for sympathy in a world that doesn’t grant them any.
Daniel Bandeira’s thriller is gripping and yet deeply unsettling as Teresa and the farm workers are brought further and further to extremes in their fight for survival. The film barrels towards an ending that feels inevitable. Perhaps it is a reflection of the only true conclusion to the extreme class divides, an explosion of violence and an undecided future. It may reflect reality, but it certainly does leave a bit of a bad taste in the mouth when reflected in film. Perhaps that is the bitter pill that is needed and PROPRIEDADE does an excellent job of bringing to light the moral difficulties of the class divide.
