A group of armed soldiers is sent to the Northeast of Brazil in an attempt to stop a famine-struck population from invading and stealing a food deposit in the dry backlands. While the alienation and insanity of people driven to hallucination by their latent hunger is conducted by the predictions of a religious figure, a truck driver observes the situation and remains torn between his friendship with the soldiers and his revolt against the lack of government action in fighting the misery that lingers over the region.

When a prolonged drought brings death and hunger to the backlands of Bahia, a group of soldiers is sent to the area to prevent the population from sacking a food depot. In this Cinema Novo classic shot in black-and-white, Ruy Guerra creates a masterful portrait of social ambiguity and the many conflicts of the individuals behind institutions. As if testing its characters and their limits when in face of injustice, OS FUZIS (The Guns) offers them the chance to opt for solidarity—even when the price is high.

“A key Cinema Novo film from Guerra at his most political. Its main trope is the gun fetishism (there is a superb scene of analyzing a Mauser’s combat potential) but, inversely, the proletariat’s necessity to rely, eventually, to armed struggle, the latter emblematized through the dismemberment of an ox. Shot in a sparing style with verité cinematography, is exploits the transition from false- to class-consciousness.” dionysus67, mubi

“The most impressive exploration of Marxist themes I have ever seen in a film. Armed young men who do little self-reflection are sent to protect a mayor from their own people, who are starving to death, paralyzed by a respect for capitalist codes and, well, guns. Meanwhile, religious fanatics congregate around a cow, being so blinded by religion that they can’t make use of the only source of food in town!” manuel viegas, mubi