Memória em Produção: uma análise da família Rocha Miranda através dos documentários “Panair do Brasil – Uma História de glamour e conspiração” e “Menino 23 – Infâncias Perdidas no Brasil

Abstract

Memory is a field permeated by power disputes and constantly shifting representations. As authors such as Jacques Le Goff and Michael Pollak have shown, the tension between official and subterranean memories reveals deep layers of social conflict and struggles for recognition. The Rocha Miranda family, a prominent figure in Brazil’s twentieth-century political and business landscape, emerges as the protagonist of two contrasting narratives presented in the documentaries Panair do Brasil – Uma História de Glamour e Conspiração and Menino 23 – Infâncias Perdidas no Brasil. In Panair do Brasil, the family is portrayed as a victim of political persecution during the military dictatorship, marked by the shutdown of Panair and the dismissal of thousands of employees. In Menino 23, other members of the same family are depicted as owners of a rural estate in the state of São Paulo where Black children, taken from a public orphanage, were subjected to forced labour under the influence of integralist and Nazi ideologies. From this contrast, the research seeks to reflect on three central questions: What is the role of documentary film as a historical agent? How does it influence the construction of the past and the framing of collective memory? And to what extent can it reconfigure the social identity of a privileged group?