The Last Novel of Balzac
Director Geraldo Sarno
Countries Brazil
Duration 74 min
Synopsis
In 1965, Waldo Vieira, a doctor and Spiritist medium who worked close to Chico Xavier, writes the novel Cristo Espera por Ti, dictated by the spirit of French writer Honoré de Balzac. Many years later, the book ends up in the hands of the psychologist Osmar Ramos Filho, newly arrived from the University of Louvain, Belgium. He dedicates 10 years of studies to it and by the end of that period writes and publishes a book containing the results of his researches: O Avesso de um Balzac Contemporâneo – Arqueologia de um Pasticho. Osmar Ramos Filho determines several links between the novel dictated by the spirit and the works of Balzac, among which a reference to the 17th century Dutchman painter Paul Potter, and a landscape description the researcher identifies with one of Potter’s paintings. From this reference and other researches, a completely original interpretation of the novel “A Pele de Onagro” emerges, never even suggested before by any of the numerous scholars who studied the enormous critical work published regarding Balzac. The Last Novel of Balzac is a documentary based on the researches of Osmar Ramos on the dictated book and the "archaeological” relations that it establishes with the work of Honoré de Balzac, especially with the novel La Peau de Chagrin (The Magic Skin). It will present and analyze the creation process of Honoré de Balzac from a quite unusual and original point of view.
In 1965, Waldo Vieira, a doctor and Spiritist medium who worked close to Chico Xavier, writes the novel Cristo Espera por Ti, dictated by the spirit of French writer Honoré de Balzac. Many years later, the book ends up in the hands of the psychologist Osmar Ramos Filho, newly arrived from the University of Louvain, Belgium. He dedicates 10 years of studies to it and by the end of that period writes and publishes a book containing the results of his researches: O Avesso de um Balzac Contemporâneo – Arqueologia de um Pasticho. Osmar Ramos Filho determines several links between the novel dictated by the spirit and the works of Balzac, among which a reference to the 17th century Dutchman painter Paul Potter, and a landscape description the researcher identifies with one of Potter’s paintings. From this reference and other researches, a completely original interpretation of the novel “A Pele de Onagro” emerges, never even suggested before by any of the numerous scholars who studied the enormous critical work published regarding Balzac. The Last Novel of Balzac is a documentary based on the researches of Osmar Ramos on the dictated book and the "archaeological” relations that it establishes with the work of Honoré de Balzac, especially with the novel La Peau de Chagrin (The Magic Skin). It will present and analyze the creation process of Honoré de Balzac from a quite unusual and original point of view.