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Helena Ignez

Helena Ignez

Acting

Biography

Helena Ignez (Salvador, May 23, 1939) is a Brazilian actress and filmmaker. Helena was born in Salvador, Bahia and was attending her second year of law school when she fell in love with theater and decided to study the Dramatic Arts at the Federal University of Bahia. At the time, the Bahian theater scene was breaking with traditional Brazilian theater and experiencing strong influence from the young vanguard. She first appeared on the screen in Glauber Rocha's short film "Pátio". Helena acted in a few films associated with the Cinema Novo movement, such as "A Grande Feira" (1961), "Assalto ao Trem Pagador" (1962), and "O Padre e a Moça" (1966) before playing Janete Jane in O Bandido da Luz Vermelha by Rogério Sganzerla. After this film, she would perform in some most significant films in the Cinema Marginal movement, which directly opposed the critically acclaimed Cinema Novo -- the most remarkable being her role as Ângela Carne e "Osso in A Mulher de Todos" (1969). She also was a financial partner of Rogério Sganzerla and fellow Cinema Marginal filmmaker Júlio Bressane in the short-lived, although prolific, Belair production company. Between 1968 and 1970, Sganzerla and Ignez made almost a dozen films together and were also married and had two children -- one of which would become actress Djin Sganzerla. As a filmmaker, Ignez has directed 7 films, the most notable being "Luz das Trevas" (2010), a sequel to Sganzerla's debut feature "O Bandido da Luz Vermelha" (1968).

Known For

Tereza Batista
8.5

No description available.

Tereza Batista

1992
Eclipse
N/A

Cleo, a 43-year-old astronomer who is pregnant and emotionally fragile, is surprised by a visit from Nalu, her half-sister of Indigenous descent. The encounter reveals dark secrets and stirs up fragmented memories in Cleo, leading the two of them down a path of mysterious investigations.

Eclipse

2026
The Red Light Bandit
7.6

Born and raised in the misery of Brazilian slums, Jorge becomes a luxury house burglar in São Paulo and gets nicknamed "The Red Light Bandit" by the sensationalist press. In addition to wearing a red flashlight, he talks to his hostages in an irreverent tone and makes bold breakthroughs to later spend the money extravagantly. His world is the decadent neighbourhood of Boca do Lixo.

The Red Light Bandit

1968
No image
7.0

No description available.

Era Preciso Voltar

1969
Brazilian Cinema in the 20th Century
N/A

Two years of research and visits to collections, cinematheques and museums; almost seventy interviews that generated 30 hours of recorded material; more than two hundred scanned photos and more than one hundred films watched. In total, more than a thousand hours of work were needed to prepare Brazilian Cinema in the 20th Century. The work is a fascinating journey through all the cinematic cycles that Brazil lived, from the pioneering Belle Époque, through the great studios like Atlântica and Cinédia, Cinema Novo, the urban comedies of the 70's, until the resumption in the late 90's. The documentary is unique, it gives the floor to who really wrote and lived this story intensely.

Brazilian Cinema in the 20th Century

2017
Celebração - 100 Anos do Cinema Nacional
N/A

"Portraits and excerpts from Brazilian films from all times. Actors, directors and images that affirm cinema."

Celebração - 100 Anos do Cinema Nacional

1997
Memórias do Grupo Opinião
N/A

Follows the story of Opinião, a theatre group created in 1964 during the early Brazilian dictatorship period to oppose the government through artistic performances. Considered the first left-wing response to the dictatorship, the group gathered now famous Brazilian artists such as Nara Leão, Maria Bethânia, João do Vale and Millôr Fernandes.

Memórias do Grupo Opinião

2019
Glauber Rocha - The Movie, Brazil's Labyrinth
6.3

Documentary about Brazilian filmmaker Glauber Rocha, one of the most important names in the Cinema Novo, with interviews with some of his friends and colleagues.

Glauber Rocha - The Movie, Brazil's Labyrinth

2003
Hotel Atlântico
7.1

A road movie that follows a solitary man as he sets of on a journey to the south of Brazil. The strange characters and absurd situations he encounters along the way present an extraordinary portrait of human relations.

Hotel Atlântico

2009
The Long Voyage of the Yellow Bus
9.0

For this behemoth, Bressane took his opera omnia and edited it in an order that first adheres to historical chronology but soon starts to move backwards and forward. The various pasts – the 60s, the 80s, the 2000s – comment on each other in a way that sheds light on Bressane’s themes and obsessions, which become increasingly apparent and finally, a whole idea of cinema reveals itself to the curious and patient viewer. Will Bressane, from now on, rework The Long Voyage of the Yellow Bus when he makes another film? Is this his latest beginning? Why not, for the eternally young master maverick seems to embark on a maiden voyage with each and every new film!

The Long Voyage of the Yellow Bus

2023
Embodiment of Evil
5.3

Released from the Mental Health Wing of São Paulo State Penitentiary after forty years, the sadistic undertaker Zé do Caixão is back on the streets, haunted by ghostly visions and spirits of past victims but still set upon the goal that sent him to prison in the first place: finding a woman who can give him the perfect child.

Embodiment of Evil

2008
Candango: Memoirs from a Festival
5.0

In 1965, a year after the military coup in Brazil, an oasis of freedom opened in the country's capital. The Brasília Film Festival: a landmark of cultural and political resistance. Its story is that of Brazilian cinema itself.

Candango: Memoirs from a Festival

2020
Light in Darkness: The Return of Red Light Bandit
5.2

Jorge, bastard child of the infamous Red Light Bandit, decides himself to pursuit a life of crime after meeting with his father, who has been incarcerated for the last 30 years.

Light in Darkness: The Return of Red Light Bandit

2012
Not Even God Is As Fair As Your Jeans
9.7

Close to turning forty and away from his job as a librarian due to depression, Marcos needs to take care of Baby, his sister's pet dog. Isolated in an apartment in the city center, Marcos relies on the support of analyst Dr. Juliana R., who sees him in therapy sessions. Together, they look for ways to deal with the grief over the death of his ex-boyfriend, Pedro, and the arrival of a new love, Gabriel. Baby, a special hairless dog of Aztec origin, will redefine his relationship with the world of the dead and the living as well.

Not Even God Is As Fair As Your Jeans

2025
Face to Face
5.5

The story of a civil servant who lives with his elderly mother. Falling in love with a corrupt politician's young and rich daughter, he abandons himself to crazy and violent situations.

Face to Face

1967
Memoirs of a Strangler of Blondes
7.5

First film by Julio Bressane shot in exile, "Memoirs" is a film about a man who repeatedly kills the same type of woman in same places, the same way. Filmed on the streets of London.

Memoirs of a Strangler of Blondes

1971
Nosferatu
N/A

Nosferatu arrives in a town escaping from Van Helsing. He brings not only his curse, but ghosts from his past. In this escape, he dives into a macabre dance searching for an actress and faces the horror of eternity and the pain of an endless existence.

Nosferatu

2025
Oswaldianas
9.0

Collective film with five segments around the works and life of brazilian writer Oswald de Andrade.

Oswaldianas

1992
Scent of Gardenias
6.6

Daniel is a taxi driver who’s married to Adalgisa. When she starts acting in low-budget movies, he forbids her from seeing their son, Joaquim. For more than a decade, Daniel nurtures a feeling of revenge for his ex-wife, which gains strength when their now adult son finds his mother in full professional decay.

Scent of Gardenias

1992
A Vermelha Luz do Bandido
N/A

Experimental documentary short that debates over Rogério Sganzerla's Brazilian cult classic "The Red Light Bandit".

A Vermelha Luz do Bandido

2009