Rethinking humanism in Brazilian cinema; or forging interspecies cosmopolitanism through lyricism and the long-take in Neon Bull.

In this paper, I explore how Gabriel Mascaro’s Neon Bull (Boi Neon, 2016) features human-animal relationships, nurturing an interspecies cosmopolitanism marked by a shared precariousness. This perspective is in line with Eduardo Mendieta’s thought, for whom interspecies cosmopolitanism not only reduces human–animal differences, but also acknowledges a “worlding of entangled vulnerabilities” (“Interspecies” 255). This perspective erases human-animal distinctions, displaces the humanist approach that characterises cosmopolitan practices, and situates subjects within a capitalist context that marginalises and commodifies their existence. Neon Bull engages with this approach and, in doing so, proposes a move that places the viewer in contact with the subjugation of humans and animals alike. I suggest that this dynamic is mediated by the film’s lyrical segments and its poetic usage of long-takes. Together, these formal devices forge interspecies cinematic encounters mobilised by affect and which, ultimately, challenge power relations and human centrism.