The Edge of Democracy (2019)

Petra Costa is known for her storytelling.  This documentary finds her intersecting the personal and political on the public stage, and in the process documents a crisis erupting in slow motion over the last several years at the heart of Brazilian politics. Thanks to extraordinary access to figures at the center of the story – former leftist Workers’ Party presidents Lula de la Silva and Dilma Rousseff, as well as rightwingers Michel Temer and current president Jair Bolsonaro– Costa manages to craft an intimate primer about the state’s descent into populism and the fraying of the country’s democratic fabric.  Her access to both sides of the story is extraordinary.  Her grandparents made their fortune in the construction industry, which propped up the likes of Temer and Bolsonaro (and continues to do so), and her Marxist parents went to prison because of their opposition to the military junta that once controlled the country. At one point, Costa observes her mother’s warm first meeting with Rousseff; both women were held at the same prison, although not at the same time, and have much in common.
The criticism that this does not show the profound descent into poverty and violence that has been rampant throughout Brazil as this story unfolded is well founded, but I appreciated the calm telling of a terrifying story of the profound influence that oligarchs wield on the world stage.