Cidade do Samba

The lives of Luhli and Lucina, two especially important artists in the alternative cultural scene during the 1970s. In a time when transgression, love and peace guided behavior, we discover the love of two women for art, their spiritual universe, their lives in community and their three-way relationship with photographer Luiz Fernando Borges da Fonseca.

Documentary about samba musician from Bahia Clementino Rodrigues, aka Riachão.

In 1976, Gilberto Gil traveled to Lagos (Nigeria) with the purpose of participating in the Second Festival of Black Art and Culture. The event had the participation of approximately fifty thousand Afro-descendant and Diaspora artists. After the trip, Gil released the album Refavela. The documentary celebrates the 40th anniversary of this album essential album for the Brazilian Popular Music.

Set against the turbulent atmosphere of the 1960s, Tropicália is a feature length documentary exploring the Brazilian artistic movement known as Tropicália, and the struggle its artists endured to protect their right to freely express revolutionary thought against the traditional Brazilian music of that time.

An intimate look at the life and career of Paulinho da Costa, the most recorded percussionist in music history. The documentary explores his unique rhythmic language and his collaboration with legendary icons.

A documentary on the influence that carnival has on the daily life of the Mangueira hill in Rio de Janeiro. It follows the manufacture of the carnivals of 1981 and 1982, interviewing several residents who tell the story of more than half a century of the favela's existence and emphasizing its community importance and cultural, to the sound of the most beautiful sambas composed on Mangueira.

In the Documentary The singer, composer, writer and bamba Martinho da Vila guides the viewer through the gigantic world of samba investigating the origins of the rhythm, highlighting its importance in different spheres, telling stories about his career and presenting his heart association, Grêmio Recreativo Samba School Unidos de Vila Isabel.

Between scenes from his concert in São Paulo's oft-inaccessible Theatro Municipal, rapper and activist Emicida celebrates the rich legacy of Black Brazilian culture.

A film that depicts the everyday life and the beauty of Portela’s Old Folk – a group of veteran samba musicians who belong to one of Rio’s most revered samba schools, the one with the most first places and accolades in Rio’s Carnaval pageant. These old gentelmen’s and ladies’ musicality and poetry are unveiled through their simple, but rich and meaningful, every day life in Oswaldo Cruz, a quaint neighborhood in Rio’s North Zone, that serves both as set and as a main character in this story.

Leci Brandão is a pioneer of socially conscious music in Brazil. A samba singer, communist party activist and the second black deputy elected in the history of the Legislative Assembly of São Paulo, she transformed her life into a fight for more diversity. As she herself says, "samba is Brazil's identity card". Several personalities reflect on the importance of Leci, at 80 years of age and with 50 years of career, in building a Brazil with less hate and more opportunities.

A host of personalities reminisce about the life and work of songwriter, lawyer, and congressman Humberto Teixeira — aka "Baião Doctor" — the author of such classic Brazilian popular songs as "Asa Branca". A musical film about the baião, a movement in Brazilian music in the 1940s and 1950s that was later snowed under by samba and bossa nova.

Marina finally returned to prominence with the release of 2003's Acústico MTV (the Brazilian equivalent of the MTV Unplugged series), which spawned two top 10 hit singles (the new track "Sugar" and a reworked version of her 1984 hit "Fullgas") and became her best selling album in over a decade. The DVD (the first of her career) was also one of the year's best sellers.

Portrait of various figures in Brazilian pop music.

Acústico MTV spans Gal Costa's career very thoroughly. What is very different here is the presentation of the material. Backed up by a lush orchestra (the Petrobrás Pró Música Orchestra), some of Gal's old hits have a beautiful new sound. Even some of her early songs, such as "Baby" and "Não Identificado," are more subdued. As a whole, the CD does show a more mature and secure performer. As added bonuses, Gal invites a few guests to sing with her. Having introduced Luiz Melodia to Brazil, Gal brings him back in "Pérola Negra," one great moment in the CD. Continuing the list of guests, Gal then introduces a new name in 1997: Zeca Baleiro. Their duet in "A Flor da Pele" is hauntingly beautiful and the most beautiful track in Acústico MTV. Targeting the younger MTV crowd, two names from Brazilian rock lend their voices in two additional duets.

The show brings together big names in Brazilian Popular Music (MPB) in a tribute to the samba musician from Vila Isabel.

"JMB, O Famigerado" is an audiovisual bricolage assault featuring the subject-object Jomard Muniz de Britto—an organic/outsider bricoleur in his seventies who guides the viewer through the city of Recife, filmed both comfortably and uncomfortably by an imperious vampire filmmaker.

New York, 2010. Jeff Harris, a music journalist, sets out to uncover the truth about Francisco Tenório Júnior, a young Brazilian samba-jazz pianist who disappeared in Buenos Aires on March 18, 1976.

The third episode of the Cities of Love franchise, Rio, I Love You is an anthology, created by 10 visionary directors from across the globe. The story line of each segment focuses on an encounter of love in a different neighborhood of the city, demonstrating the distinctive qualities and character of that location. The film serves to bridge gaps between cultures, educating and entertaining the audience, while celebrating unique and universal expressions of love.

Against the backdrop of a turbulent era in Brazil, this documentary captures Pelé's extraordinary path from breakthrough talent to national hero. Mixing rare archival footage and exclusive interviews, this documentary celebrates the legendary Brazilian footballer who personified football as art.

A look at the Brazilian black movement between 1977 and 1988, going by the relationship between Brazil and Africa.

Based on the life of a legendary capoeira fighter from Bahia, "Besouro" spins a fantastic tale of a young Brazilian man of African descent in search of his mission.

This film shines a light at the story of Jards Macalé, polemic artist and controversial character of Brazilian culture over the last four decades. Author of songs such as "Vapor Barato" and "Movimento dos Barcos", a partner in crime of poet Waly Salomão, guitar player and songwriter for Gal Costa and Caetano Veloso, actor and author of soundtracks in Nelson Pereira dos Santos' films, a personal friend of visual artists Lygia Clarke and Hélio Oiticica, but, first and foremost, someone who dreams of seeing the word "love" in the Brazilian flag.

Covering the last years of the famous Brazilian fashion designer in her doomed quest for justice, Zuzu Angel follows the case of her activist son Stuart's arrest, torture, murder, and subsequent corpse disposal by the military forces in early 1970s Rio de Janeiro, during the darkest era of Brazilian military regime and media censorship.

A woman is taken along with her mother in 1910 to a far-away desert by her husband, and after his passing, is forced to spend the next 59 years of her life hopelessly trying to escape it.

From his origins as a poet to his success as a singer and composer, Arnaldo Antunes revisits the most remarkable moments of his career.

The trajectory of the clumsy reporter Agamenon Mendes Pereira, always present in key events of history, his biggest scoops and his eternal love for Isaura, who survives his unexpected travels around the world, in search of news and fame.

Portugal, Brazil and Cape Verde. Countries linked by the sea and the culture of nostalgia. The film travels across three continents and finds characters marked by absences produced by events that transform the history of these countries. Like fascism, colonization, slavery, dictatorships and leaving never to return. The culture of saudade is the thread that connects conversations by the sea.

This documentary investigates the aesthetic, political and existential trajectory of emblematic Black Brazilian actor Antônio Pitanga. His career spans over five decades, and he has worked with iconic Brazilian filmmakers Glauber Rocha, Cacá Diegues and Walter Lima Jr. He was a prominent figurehead and outspoken activist during the Brazilian dictatorship, a period of unrest in Brazilian cinema. "Pitanga" deep dives into the world of Antônio and the history of Brazil. The documentary was directed by his daughter Camila Pitanga, one of widely recognised faces in Brazilian television and cinema right now. The film is also a poem, and a tender ode to fatherhood.

A sound and visual journey that portrays the life and work of singer and composer Luiz Melodia. The Poet of Estácio himself tells us, in the first person, his trajectory as a black boy born on the hill until his transformation into one of the greatest artists in the history of MPB. The film also features an unpublished collection made available by Jane Reis, his wife and businesswoman.

The life and musical work of Brazilian zoologist and composer Paulo Vanzolini, author of very popular songs such as "Ronda," "Volta por Cima," and "Na Boca da Noite," recording tributes to the composer, which brought together big names in Brazilian music such as Inezita Barroso, Chico Buarque, Paulinho da Viola, and Martinho da Vila.

It tells the story of the musicians who revitalized Lapa, from the end of the 90s, in meetings on the small stage of "Bar Semente". The documentary is a historical record of a stronghold of cultural effervescence that remained in the affective memory of Rio de Janeiro.

A documentary chronicling the life and works of Brazilian poet, songwriter, journalist and avant-garde filmmaker Torquato Neto, from his beginnings to his suicide at the age of 28.