The Dead of the Twentieth Century: The Past in Fragments and Little Stories

Abstract

Consistent with the political sense of those narratives on history, the present paper approximates Marcelo Masagão and Walter Benjamin for an interpretive reading of the ‘essay-film’ Nós que aqui estamos por vós esperamos (1998). Far from trying to introduce subtitles in the narrative of images by Masagão with the notions by Benjamin, the reflection here advanced restates the task of revolving the debris of the past in order to think on the present. Considered one of the most instigating Brazilian films for the investigation of the political role of the public as citizens, this ‘essay-film’ is discussed under the perspective of the artistic experience as a form of knowledge.