Fernando Ramos da Silva gives Pixote a child who needs attention without making him conveniently endearing. We recommend the film above all for his guarded, painfully convincing performance, which holds our interest when the writing repeats itself.
Fi1m perspective
Fernando Ramos da Silva’s face in Pixote (1980) is guarded even when the boy’s need for attention is apparent. Héctor Babenco gives that face time to hold us, and da Silva offers little of the sweetness that might make a child in danger easier to watch. We were horrified by the reformatory passages because he seemed so unsurprised by the brutality around him. He makes the boy’s capacity to endure convincing without suggesting it will be enough to protect him.
That is a substantial achievement in a film whose writing sometimes makes the children’s prospects too predictably hopeless. Babenco announces his concern for them in an on-camera introduction; da Silva then has to make us care about one particular child. His watchfulness leaves us unsure how much of that child’s feeling we are being allowed to see. The director is right to let the unease persist, although the film around the performance presses the same painful point too often.
The subsequent work did not dislodge Pixote as his defining role, and professional perceptions of him remained tied to the character. He played Pingo in the soap opera O Amor é Nosso (1981) and Bié in Leon Hirszman’s Eles Não Usam Black-Tie (1981). A small part as Tuísca in Bruno Barreto’s Gabriela (1983) was his final credited film appearance. The later film parts were small, leaving Pixote to carry much of any assessment of his acting. We should be cautious about turning that limited record into a verdict on what else he could have done.
Calling his work naturalistic is fair, though the word can make the acting sound less considered than it appears on screen. Babenco selected him from around 1,300 applicants; what matters is the director’s patience once he has him in front of the camera. Da Silva never makes Pixote conveniently endearing, and Babenco does not ask him to. Start with Pixote, provided its repeated insistence on hopelessness is something the evening can bear.
Biography
Fernando Ramos da Silva (29 November 1967 – 25 August 1987) was a Brazilian actor. He became known for his leading role as the title character in Héctor Babenco's 1980 film Pixote: A Lei do Mais Fraco.
Da Silva was selected from more than a thousand young applicants for the part. He subsequently appeared in They Don't Wear Black Tie (1981) as Bié and Gabriela (1983) as Tuísca, and had a role in the telenovela O Amor É Nosso (1981). He was shot and killed by police in São Paulo at the age of 19.
