Zé do Caixão
| José Mojica Marins | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born |
March 13, 1936 São Paulo, Brazil |
| Nationality | Brazilian |
| Other names | Zé do Caixão Coffin Joe Mojica J. Avelar |
| Occupation |
Filmmaker Film actor Television actor Media personality |
José Mojica Marins (born March 13, 1936) is a Brazilian filmmaker, actor, composer, screenwriter, and television and media personality. Marins is also known by his alter ego Coffin Joe (loosely translated from Zé do Caixão). Although Marins is known primarily as a horror film director, his earlier works were Westerns, dramas and adventure films.
Marins was born in São Paulo, Brazil at a farm in the Vila Mariana, to Antônio and Carmem Marins. His interest in filmmaking began at an early age. When Marins was three, his father ran a local cinema, and the family lived in a flat above the theater.
Coffin Joe is the English equivalent of Zé do Caixão. Marins created the character in 1963 for the film At Midnight I'll Take Your Soul. The character went on to appear in many more films and as it gained popularity, the Coffin Joe persona appeared in television programs, songs, music videos and comic books.
Although rarely mentioned in the films, Coffin Joe's true name is Josefel Zanatas. Marins gives an explanation for the name in an interview for Portal Brasileiro de Cinema:
"I was thinking a name: Josefel: "fel" ("gall") for being bitter — and also Zanatas as a last name, because backward it reads "Satanás" ("Satan")".
Coffin Joe wears a black suit, a cape and a top hat. His most notable features are his grotesquely long, curled fingernails. Marins grew his fingernails several inches long for the role, always wearing them in public in the style of the character.
Coffin Joe is an evil, amoral character who considers himself superior to others and exploits them to suit his purposes. He hates morality and superstition (which he includes religion as) to the point of obsession. His central belief is that (self) imposed superstitious beliefs tend to prevent individual development, inhibit positive social change. Those who do not accept his central belief are considered to be weak, lack power, and limited in their ability to rationalize objectively. Those who share with him similar beliefs are considered to have power and intelligence above the 'normal' person.
The primary theme of the character is his single-minded obsession with the "continuity of the blood"; he wants to sire the "superior" child from the "perfect woman." His idea of a "perfect woman" is not exactly physical but someone he regards intellectually superior to the Brazilian average, and in this quest he is willing to kill anyone who crosses his path.
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