Western Animation / Juro Que Vi

"If it's true or false, I don't know. But who was there told me the story like that and said: 'I swear I saw it'."

Juro Que Vi (I Swear I Saw It) is an award-winning Brazilian Animated Anthology television series of five shorts produced from 2003 to 2008 by government agency MultiRio, in collaboration with children from public elementary schools from Rio de Janeiro. Each episode is about a different mythical character from Brazilian Folklore, with each introduction and conclusion narrated by a different actor.

The series was made with the intention of teaching children about Brazilian folklore, the protection of the environment, and other important themes in an entertaining way. The collection was nominated for national and international prizes, winning the best animated short film category in the Grand Prize Cinema Brazil in 2010.

The series consists on five ten to thirteen minutes shorts:

• The Curupira (2003): When a poacher and his helper enter the forest to hunt for sport, they become victims of the Curupira, a powerful being from the woods with red hair and backwards feet that protects the forest from unfair hunting.
• The Boto (2004): In the banks of the Amazon river, the daughter of a fisherman meets a short man who, in truth, is a disguised pink boto - another name for the Amazonian river dolphin - who turns into a man at night to party and seduce women.
• Iara (2004): When running away from the mining during the period of slavery, a young slave finds the Iara, the mother of the river, a mermaid who lures men to the heart of the forest with her singing.
• Matinta-Perera (2006): A girl and her cat are accidentally brought to the dwelling of the Matinta-Perera, an old Wicked Witch with the power to turn into a bird of ill omen who demands offerings from the villagers. However, the girl and the cat discover that the witch isn't what it seems.
• The Saci (2008): In the countryside of Minas Gerais, a bitter farmer searching for something long gone confronts the Saci-Pererê, a mischievous elf-like being with the appearance of a single-legged black child who loves to cause chaos and pranks wherever he goes.

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Juro Que Vi has examples of these tropes:

In General

• Character Title: Each title is named after the character from Brazilian Folklore the short is going to be about.
• Framing Device: All the shorts are narrated by an unseen storyteller stating that they heard the story happened in Brazil's countryside, adding to the Oral Tradition aspect of folklore.
• Medium Blending: Downplayed; the animation is mostly done with 2D animation, but some shots and scenes also use 3D effects, such as some opening shots and the vines in The Curupira.
• Mime and Music-Only Cartoon: With exception of the opening and ending narration, all the shorts have no spoken lines.
• No Name Given: Due to the series having no dialogue, the only named characters within the work are the titular folkloric beings.
• Once per Episode: Every short starts with a different guest narrator, saying he or she doesn't know if the story being told is true, but that the people who told them say that they swear they saw it.
• Shown Their Work: While it takes liberties, such as toning down some aspects to make the stories more suitable to young viewers, the series replicates Brazilian country lifestyle and folklore with great accuracy and respect, showing a couple of small details that don't frequently appear in other productions involving folklore, such as Curupira's and Saci's signature whistling and the Saci being able to juggle fireballs.
• Special Guest: Each short has a narration done by a different famous actor.
• Title Drop: In the start and end of every short, the narrator states that the people who told them the story affirmed it was truth and said "I swear I saw it".

The Curupira

• Amusing Injuries: When trying to run away, the poacher's helper hits the branch of a tree, is launched into the air and actually lands really well... only for a jackfruit to fall on his head.
• Animation Bump: After the hunter tries to shoot the Curupira, several still scenes of animals looking in shock and horror are shown as the gunshot is heard, which are drawn in a more realistic way than the more cartoonish animals previously seen in order to make the moment more dramatic.
• Back from the Dead: The Curupira uses vines to resurrect the mother armadillo the poacher had killed.
• Between My Legs: The first scene fully showing the Curupira builds up with the hunter's helper seeing him through a shot in the perspective of his legs, emphasizing his backwards feet first.
• Cassandra Truth: The poacher initially dismisses his helper's desesperate waring of the Curupira when he finds no one. When he sees that an arrow had hit his gun, however, he starts to take it seriously.
• Creepy Good: The Curupira has glowing eyes, pointy teeth, backwards feet, a serious expression, and makes a creepy smile as he transforms the hunter into a peccary, but he is a benevolent guardian of nature who ressurects the hunt the poacher had killed and spares the poacher's helper in the end.
• Eye Awaken: Right after the hunter kills an armadillo, Curupira's glowing eyes can be seen opening in the dark far away.
• Forced Transformation: In the end, the Curupira turns the poacher into a peccary as a punishment after he tries to shoot him down, which he then uses to ride away.
• Foreshadowing: The poacher has a pig-like nose, indicating how he gets turned into a wild pig in the end.
• Giving Up the Ghost: The poacher's helper soul leaves his body after he passes out, but after seeing Curupira's arrow, even the soul gets scared and returns to his body.
• Green Aesop: Akin to the myths, the Curupira punishes those who disrespect the woods and kill animals for sport, rather then for necessity, especially mothers of cubs.
• Hero Antagonist: The Curupira acts as a menacing and sinister antagonist for the characters for most of the short, but he is defending nature from a poacher who had killed a mother with its cub.
• Hold Up Your Score: When the poacher's helper tries to run away in fear of the Curupira, he hits a tree branch, is launched into the air, and manages to land perfectly, to which a monkey he had freed earlier and a coatimundi give him a 9 and a 8,5 score signs. When a jackfruit falls on his head right after though, a sloth methodically gives him 3.
• Karmic Transformation: The poacher, who becomes a target of the Curupira due to his unfair hunting, is transformed into a wild animal himself.
• Nature Spirit: The Curupira is an ominous, mysterious being of the forest with control over the woods who punishes the ones who needlessly attack nature.
• Plucky Comic Relief: The hunter's helper is the main source of humour in the short, due to his clumsiness, cartoonish antics, and sheer fear of the Curupira.
• Sinister Whistling: Like in folklore, the Curupira is always followed by a high-pitched ominous whistle, adding to his mysterious nature.
• Transmutation: When the hunter shoots the Curupira, the latter paralyzes the bullet mid air right before it hits his eye and turns it into a firefly.
• The Trees Have Faces: Before sighting the Curupira for the first time, the poacher's helper starts seeing frightful monsters in the tree trunks after setting aroud the fire, much to his fright.

The Boto

• Bait-and-Switch Character Intro: When the boto first enters the party, only his shadow is seen at first, which with the tense music and the reaction of the people, makes the man look like a big and menacing outsider; then, the camera goes down to reveal a comical and pretty short man who starts to happily play a triangle.
• Boyfriend-Blocking Dad: The fisherman is pretty protective of his daughter and tries to catch the boto after he saw him staring at her at the party, being the reason why the boto suddenly had to leave the woman before they kissed. He seems to have regretted it after he saw how sad his daughter got, however.
• The Casanova: The boto intentionally and unintentionally seduces almost all of the women at a party, and the ending of the short shows that he had his fair share of affairs and sons.
• Dirty Old Woman: From all the women that fell in love with the boto at the party, the one who got the most excited was an old lady who desperately tried to kiss him.
• Eyes Always Shut: The fisherman is mostly seen with a grumpy-looking face and his eyes closed.
• Fainting: Several women find the boto in disguise so handsome that they immediately faint.
• Friendly, Playful Dolphin: The boto, the amazonian river dolphin, is playful and waves to the woman in his animal form.
• Half-Human Hybrid: It is shown in the end that the boto has had several other affairs in the past, as a couple of babies with their mothers is seen squirting water from their heads like dolphins.
• Head-Turning Beauty: With exception of the daughter of the fisherman, every woman in the party falls in love with the boto and send him kisses.
• Meaningful Gift: The boto gives the woman a necklace with a shell, which she accidentally drops in the water when her dad suddenly made her go back to the boat. On the next day, the boto comes back in his animal form and givers her the necklace back, showing her he truly was the mysterious man in the party.
• Missing Mom: Despite a family picture showing all three, the daughter of the fisherman only ever appears with her dad, even when they go to a party at night, implying her mother passed away and that her father had been raising her alone (possibly the reason why he is so protective).
• No Cartoon Fish: The fish are drawn in a less cartoonish way than the Boto.
• Morphic Resonance: In his animal form, the boto has a hair strand that evokes his hairstyle as a man. In human form, he wears pink clothes and still has a blowhole, which he hides with his hat.
• Shapeshifting Excludes Clothing: When the boto returns and turns into a man in the river at the end, he is naked, only receiving the hat the woman had kept.
• Shapeshifting Seducer: Akin to folklore, the boto turns into a man at night with which all the women in the party immediately fall in love, to the point that even he feels overwhelmed.
• Transformation Sequence: The boto has one in the end when he turns into a human, as the fish of the river obscure flippers to reveal arms and a tail to reveal legs.

Iara

• Adaptational Heroism: In Brazilian Folklore, Iara is a deceptive mermaid who, in most versions, lures men to her river with her singing and beauty so she drowns or devours them. In the short, she is gentle to the young man by kissing his forehead at their first meeting and saves him from drowning by the end.
• All There in the Manual: The official description of the short in MultiRio's website reveals that the name of the protagonist is Pedro, which the narrator doesn't reveal in the short proper.
• Big Bad: The mine owner is the main villain of the story, as a vicious and greedy slaveowner who acts with an iron fist to the miners and almost drowns Pedro by the end after he tried to escape slavery. Notably, it is the only short of the series with a direct villainous antagonist.
• Death by Materialism: An ambiguous case with the mine owner. After he catches Pedro when they both fall of a waterfall, he abandons him after seeing a giant gold nugget at the floor of the river. When he swims there and tries to carry it, however, the nugget reveals itself far too heavy for him, but he futilely keeps trying to lift it up regardless. According to the narrator, they say he is there to this day.
• Elemental Hair Composition: Iara's hair is blue in the same tone of the river, showing her connection with water.
• Enthralling Siren: The Iara attracts Pedro with her singing, but in a positive example, they fall in love.
• Godiva Hair: Iara's long hair is what obscures her chest.
• Gold Fever: The mine owner cares about gold more than anything or anyone else, even himself, tormenting Pedro when he manages to find a nugget and threatening him when he finds he had discovered another in Iara's dwelling. His greed is ultimately his downfall when he ends up spending the rest of his life trying to take out a giant nugget too heavy for him to carry out of a river.
• Happily Ever After: The narrator brings this up as a possibility to what happened with Pedro and Iara's love story after the end.
• Inevitable Waterfall: Pedro is dragged to a waterfall, which he ends up deciding to jump in order to escape from the mine owner.
• Monster-Shaped Mountain: The cave which leads to Iara's dwelling has the shape of a woman looking down.
• One-Woman Wail: Iara's song is only heard as an ethereal, wordless singing from the distance.
• Super Not-Drowning Skills: The Iara is implied to give this ability to Pedro, saving him from drowing and allowing him to live with her in the river. The mine owner also doesn't show any trouble with staying underwater when he tries to carry the gold nugget and is said to keep trying to take it to this day, although in his case it was possible he was simply holding his breath during the moments shown.
• Villainous Gold Tooth: All of the mine owner's teeth are made of gold, highlighting his obsession with it from his first appearance. He's a vicious and greedy slaveowner who rules the miners with an iron fist and almost drowns Pedro after he tried to escape slavery.

Matinta-Perera

• Adaptational Nice Girl: In folklore, the Matinta Perera is a Wicked Witch that turns into a bird of ill omen and disturbs people with her singing until they agree to give her gifts of food or tobacco, cursing them with misfortune if the promise isn't kept. In the short, this is what the townsfolk believed it would happen, but in truth, the Matinta is actually a kind and lovely lady that would never harm anyone.
• Animal Eyes: The Matinta-Perera has horizontal eyelids, similar to those of an alligator, adding to her mysterious nature.
• Bait-and-Switch Silhouette: When he enters the Matinta's dwelling, the cat sees through a curtain the sillhouette of the witch seemingly wrapping a rope around the girl's neck and lifting her off the ground... only to pass through the curtain and see that they were just playing with the ropes of a grandfather clock.
• Children Are Innocent: The girl is the only one to not fear the Matinta and becomes friends with her. The cat is suspicious at first, but later warms up to her as well.
• Clothes Make the Superman: Her cloak is presumably how the Matinta is able to turn into a bird, since right after she gives the girl one of these, she can turn into a bird as well.
• Creepy Good: The Matinta can be quite unsettling at first, but she is nothing more than a generous old woman who helps the girl go back home, shelters hundreds of birds in her dwelling, and gives the cat milk to drink.
• The Dreaded: The Matinta is utterly feared in the town she flys over, with everyone immediately going inside, closing their windows and making offerings of food to leave outside of the front door.
• Empathic Environment: In the opening narration, the clouds in the sky have the shapes of screaming and agonizing people, relating to how the Matinta is feared and set to be a cruel monster. But when the girl and Matinta fly through the sky next to the end, the clouds now look like happy people smiling, relating to how now it is known that the witch is actually a good person.
• Establishing Character Moment: The Matinta and the girl playing together with a grandfather clock is the first scene that confirms to the cat and the viewer that the witch is actually a kind and warm-hearted friend.
• Hidden Depths: The mysterious, dreaded witch thought to be a sinister villain is a playful, kind, and religious old lady who feeds hundreds of birds.
• Just in Time: After the girl falls over the tree outside of the Matinta's mountain, the witch instructs her to turn into a bird right before she falls on the ground.
• Meaningful Gift: The girl gives Matinta her doll, which was so important to her that she risked being seen by the Matinta to retrieve it after her mother accidentally placed it in the offering, as a sign of their friendship.
• Mistaken for Murderer: When the Matinta and the girl play with the ropes of a grandfather clock, the cat, seeing the scene through a curtain, thinks that the former is hanging the girl.
• Voluntary Shapeshifting: The Matinta, and later the girl thanks to a borrowed cape, can turn into a bird at will.
• Wicked Witch: Subverted; the Matinta is initially set by the narrative as a dangerous witch, with the townsfolk hurrying to put offerings on the outside of their houses so she will leave them alone, but as the girl and the cat discover, this couldn't be farther from truth.

The Saci

• Fairy in a Bottle: Akin to folklore, the farmer manages to trap the Saci by throwing a sieve at him while he was distracted and putting him inside of a bottle, leaving the Saci defenseless.
• Gag Haircut: The Saci gives several different hairstyles to horses, as a play on how the saci on folklore makes braidlocks on horses manes as pranks.
• Peeve Goblins: The Sacis-Pererês are mischievous sprites with the appearance of single-legged black children who love to cause harmless pranks to torment people, such as scaring the animals and tangling horse's manes. Despite his mischief, however,the main Saci proves to be good-hearted and saves the life of the farmer, also allowing him to regain the childhood he never had.
• Say My Name: The farmer's only spoken line is furiously shouting "Saci!" in response to the latter's antics.
• Used to Be a Sweet Kid: The Saci discovers through a memory book in the attic that the grumpy and neurotic farmer was an enthusiastic and sweet boy once, before the hard work to get higher in life.