As a Brazilian-Colombian culture critic, the lack of specificity and the generalization of Latine people as one group has always been irritating at best and harmful at worst. Stories about Brazilian immigrants in the U.S. barely exist, and when they do, they do not reflect the realities and experiences of actual Brazilian immigrants. From the fetishization of Brazilians — both men and women — as sexually exotic characters to the casting of Hispanic Latine or just full-on Spanish actors to play Brazilians (shout out to Javier Bardem in Eat, Pray, Love; what a bizarre casting choice) who struggle with the Portuguese-accented English, these are details that someone who isn’t Brazilian probably wouldn’t notice. But for me, it’s a dead giveaway that the scriptwriters of a project don’t care to know their Brazilian characters and are using their Brazilianness as a way to exoticize that particular character. I had pretty much given up on any U.S. TV or film that explores Brazilian immigrants with a humanizing approach, until Amazon Prime Video’s Música.
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