In an early moment of Marcel Camus’s 1959 classic Black Orpheus a gorgeous and tempestuous young woman steps out of the office of the justice of the peace and onto the Rio de Janeiro street and is immersed in the throbbing rhythm of Carnival and Bossa Nova. Instantly, she is dancing. It is an astonishing, shimmering, ecstatic movement of incalculable exuberance. She resembles nothing so much as a flame in a purple dress. Her dance is about beauty, history, Africa, sex, being young and being a woman. Men of all ages join in her celebration as she gyrates down the street; she is true and she is perfect. In this brief, shining moment is distilled the essence of Black Orpheus, a laughing, sparkling, cinematic fete about the joy of being alive.