French director Marcel Camus received the 1959 Golden Palm for Orfeu Negro and the Oscar for best foreign film. Orfeu Negro tells the Brazilian-transposed myth of Orpheus and Eurydice, played by black actors.

Streetcar conductor Orpheus is in love with Euridice but engaged to another. Amid the revelry of the Rio de Janeiro carnival, Euridice is pursued by a carnival guest dressed as Death, while Orpheus tries to save her… But the film is much more than this story, it is a whirlwind of colors and an ocean of music, in one fell swoop this film made the bossa nova known outside Brazil.