Disturbing-Float-Of-The-Year Award goes to...

Every couple years there's a Carnaval float that really raises some eyebrows. First off, you've got to understand that Carnaval parade themes are not always about good or happy things. They're supposed to be about IMPORTANT things, things that really matter in our lives. And that means it's considered valid to have Carnaval floats about slavery, murder, war, AIDS... you get the idea.

When these floats are done well, they can move people to tears. I got all choked up two years ago by the grim statues of slaves-in-chains on the back of a float about the history of Brazil - suffering in a hell of fake flickering fire, and holding up the entire float. Unidos da Tijuca last year had a horrifying float that vividly re-enacted the napalm fire-bombing of a Vietnamese village, memorialized forever by the famous news photograph of the little naked girl fleeing her burning village. (Tijuca's theme that year was photography).

So you do get shocking floats sometimes. Well, this year it's Viradouro's turn. Viradouro's theme this year is, simply, "It's hair-raising" - "É de arrepiar". The parade will begin innocently enough, with an enormous mountain of ice that will quite literally make the hair stand up in goosebumps. (The abre-alas, first parade float, is going to have an entire ski slope with 26 tons of snow - and actual skiers! - and, yes, more penguins) But later the parade will have a section of things that are hair-raising in the sense of being emotionally horrifying. The carnavalesco, Paulo Barros, intends that section of the parade to be a protest against the greatest atrocities ever commited by mankind. And that means he's planning an enormous Holocaust float.

A moving mountain of emaciated skeletons.

It is planned to be the only float without any choreography or "theatricalization" - meaning, no samba dancers, no scantily clad girls. It would be followed by alas (parade sections) dressed in costumes that depict other historic atrocities.

Makes you want to jump right up and sing along, doesn't it?

The Israeli Federation of the state of Rio de Janeiro has just announced that this is an inappropriate topic for a Carnaval float. Sergio Niskier, president of the federation, met with the Viradouro planners and understands their good intentions of memorializing, not celebrating, the Holocaust, but he fears the public will misunderstand. No word yet on whether Viradouro will change its plans.

(PS - A photo of the half-finished float has been circulating on the net, but under the misapprehension that it is a depiction of the TAM airplane crash last year.)