RIO DE JANEIRO - EXTRAVAGANT floats accompanied by dancing armies and tanned beauties captivated Rio de Janeiro late on Monday as the city rolled out its second and final carnival parades that have already stirred controversy.

Six samba schools unveiled dream-like allegorical scenes as they competed to be named the best and most imaginative group during this year's pre-Lent celebrations.

Overnight on Sunday, another six schools showed off their creations - including a gruesome one filled with jigging cockroaches and a giant bloody baby that was designed to be a jolting experience eliciting fear and disgust in the audience.

The processions mark the climax of Brazil's five-day carnival, which falls just before Ash Wednesday.

Tuesday's entries were to unfold all through the night, and were to be broadcast around the world.

The first school out the gate, Mocidade, presented ranks of jesters and colonial-era soldiers around huge galleons in a representation of Portugal's role in creating modern Brazil.

Its imagery was that usually associated with Brazil's festival: stunning women in feathers and sparkles, joyous samba dancers in elaborate costumes and towering effigies with unparalleled fantastical rendering.

Monday's show, though, closed with more than a little controversy - and some questionable taste.

The Unidos do Viradouro school took delight in the macabre, deploying dancers dangling their 'heads' alongside a phalanx of Edward Scissorhands and a group made up to look like creatures from the film 'Alien.' There were also scuttling black spiders, jack-in-the-box coffins, and a float from which a giant baby dangled headfirst, bloodied and with an umbilical cord attached.

Final number
But it was its final number - a silent float topped with a motionless group wearing gags over their mouths - that grabbed most attention.

That was a replacement platform for a float banned by a judge last week that would have depicted Holocaust victims under a dancing Hitler.

The school said the modified float was a protest against the judge's decision, made at the urging of a Rio Jewish group.

'The summary prohibition of artistic expression is the first step towards the precipice: the burning of books, film censorship, the destruction of allegories,' it said in a statement.

The lighter part of its spectacle was a mobile 30-meter ski slope, complete with skiers and snowboarders. That was meant to evoke a feeling of extreme cold in the audience - something never felt in this tropical nation.

Tuesday's lot were to try to erase those disturbing scenes with their own over-the-top allegories.

The final school to perform was to be last year's winner, Beija Flor, which was to unveil its take on legends in northern Brazil.

Each school counted up to 5,000 members, making them logistically complex operations to direct over the 80 minutes they take to march and dance along the 700-metre Samborome runway. Judges were to score them on the performance of the bands, the originality of their themes, the beauty of their dancing queens, and choreography, among other criteria.

Carnival fever was also heating up other parts of the country, notably in the northern cities such as Recife and Salvador where Brazil's African influences on the Christian rite were even more marked. -- AFP