Mr. Sganzerla: Os Signos da Luz

In 1982, almost five million people took theaters to see Erotic Things, the first Brazilian porn film. The production is today considered a major episode in the history of Brazilian cinema because it was launched during the country's military dictatorship. Thirty years later, The First Time of Brazilian Cinema found the producers and actors to tell the inside story of this fascinating journey.

"Portraits and excerpts from Brazilian films from all times. Actors, directors and images that affirm cinema."

The feature-length documentary Fakir portrays the success of fakirism in Brazil, Latin America and France. This circus art origin show is presented and analyzed through archives that reveals the success of these presentations with their pain resistance championships and the great public presence, including politicians and government officials. Fakir spans current footage from contemporary artists who keep this art alive in performances and shows.

For this behemoth, Bressane took his opera omnia and edited it in an order that first adheres to historical chronology but soon starts to move backwards and forward. The various pasts – the 60s, the 80s, the 2000s – comment on each other in a way that sheds light on Bressane’s themes and obsessions, which become increasingly apparent and finally, a whole idea of cinema reveals itself to the curious and patient viewer. Will Bressane, from now on, rework The Long Voyage of the Yellow Bus when he makes another film? Is this his latest beginning? Why not, for the eternally young master maverick seems to embark on a maiden voyage with each and every new film!

A documentary about Orson Welles's unfinished three-part film about South America.

In 1965, a year after the military coup in Brazil, an oasis of freedom opened in the country's capital. The Brasília Film Festival: a landmark of cultural and political resistance. Its story is that of Brazilian cinema itself.

The art of Arrigo Barnabé, one of the pillars of the São Paulo experimental music scene during the 80's and author of critically acclaimed albums such as "Clara Crocodilo" (1980) and "Tubarões Voadores" (1984).

Between February an May of 1970, Julio Bresane and Rogerio Sganzerla made 7 films for their company Belair that were forbidden by the Brazilian censorship that reveal today images of an unique freedom.

Through testimonies from partners, workers, collaborators, artists, and people who followed the productions of Lira Paulistana, the film tells the story of this cultural phenomenon, a catalyst for the new musical trends of the time, which took place in São Paulo between 1979 and 1986. In addition to showcasing the undeniable importance of Lira Paulistana as a stage for avant-garde music in São Paulo, highlights its significant role in other areas, such as record production, journalism, editorial work, and the visual arts.

In search of a powerful hallucinogenic, five friends embark on a dangerous journey deep into the Amazon. But a bad trip isn't the only threat as they discover when they stumble across the hidden camp of the crazed Dr. Moreau and his murderous animal-human hybrid creations.

Silmara, an industrial worker and a woman of exuberant beauty, supports her arsonist father and gets involved with two different pop stars, from whom she learns traumatic life lessons.

Alice is forced to move alone to a small town, where she meets a new group of friends. While breaking into an amusement park to rescue one of her classmates, Alice discovers secrets about her identity and must make choices.

Andréa, a poor telemarketing salesgirl, dreams of being a singer. Her rich boyfriend Fred hires a musical producer, Marcelo, to turn her into a star. But she and Marcelo end up falling in love.

Dr. George Medeiros, a brilliant scientist, is badly disfigured when his wife takes a lover and plans to murder him. After months in the hospital, he returns with nothing in mind but revenge.

Coffin Joe hosts this anthology of three short horror stories which feature a strange dollmaker, a necrophiliac balloon seller with a foot fetish, and a psychotic professor involved in sadistic rituals.

Young directors are filming “The Exhibitionist” in the middle of a farm in a paradise-like region. The film poetically investigates the Brazilian soul, with the Amazon as the center of the world, reflecting on existential issues, the right to sexual freedom and individuality.

Born and raised in the misery of Brazilian slums, Jorge becomes a luxury house burglar in São Paulo and gets nicknamed "The Red Light Bandit" by the sensationalist press. In addition to wearing a red flashlight, he talks to his hostages in an irreverent tone and makes bold breakthroughs to later spend the money extravagantly. His world is the decadent neighbourhood of Boca do Lixo.

Nosferatu arrives in a town escaping from Van Helsing. He brings not only his curse, but ghosts from his past. In this escape, he dives into a macabre dance searching for an actress and faces the horror of eternity and the pain of an endless existence.

On set, in the middle of the Atlantic Forest, a stressed film director begins another day of filming, reproducing the celebration of the first mass in Brazil. Suddenly three strange agents emerge from the forest and abruptly interrupt the scene. Authoritarians, they confiscate the filmed negatives. The paranoid director grumbles: "Are they from the government?". The execution of the film is compromised. Will the director in trouble be able to complete his film?

Ângela Carne e Osso (Angela Meat and Bone), a young nymphomaniac, lives surrounded by delinquents, and exerts intense allure on them, dominating them all with her erotic power.

Cleo, a 43-year-old astronomer who is pregnant and emotionally fragile, is surprised by a visit from Nalu, her half-sister of Indigenous descent. The encounter reveals dark secrets and stirs up fragmented memories in Cleo, leading the two of them down a path of mysterious investigations.

The story of Orisbela, a young and religious woman who comes from Portugal to Brazil to marry Francisco de Albuquerque, a rude sugar-cane plantation owner, in 1570.

A group of young people is in a bar to drink, and they are trying to choose a story for the movie they are decided to make, but their characters are not very satisfied with the results of it.

A marginal version of Brecht’s piece, “Baal”.

Based on the life of Brazilian poet Anderson Bigode Herzer, this intense drama tells the story of Bauer, a trans man who navigates a difficult life in an orphanage before finding love with young librarian Clara.

Bressane’s first color film, shot in the home of the artist Elyseu Visconti. Part of it is missing sound and final editing because the director was forced to leave Brazil. Horror and humor to deal with the subject of insanity: “In the end everyone leaves the house as though they were laboratory mice escaping, they invade the city and contaminate the world”. “If we talk about horror, this film deals with national horror, with Mojica Marins as an emblem. There might be a few touches of Corman and English horror, but it is another level of horror. What transformed the film was the location where we were shooting, the house of a 19th century painter, a receptacle of light. When I arrived and saw that house, that light, I said: ‘This is the film. This is the horror’. The meaning of the film, its appeal, derives from this laboratory of light” (J. Bressane). — Torino Film Festival

Hated by the Greeks, detested by the Trojans, Helena lives a peaceful life in Guaratiba, a fishing neighborhood in Rio de Janeiro. Until love knocks on her door, bringing back ghosts from her past.

“If you had to choose between me and your mother, who would it be?” Capitu asks provocatively of her problematic lover. Elsewhere, they dance to inaudible music with their friends, each couple keeping to a rhythm of their own. At times, this depiction of the memories we see one Dom Casmurro commit to paper with a flamboyant pen seems to be an interplay of conflicting emotions – particularly when jealousy raises its head. Adapted from the Brazilian classic novel 'Dom Casmurro' (1899) by Machado de Assis as an ironic/philosophical essay on poetry and jealousy, and featuring fragments of Bressane’s previous works.

Jorge, bastard child of the infamous Red Light Bandit, decides himself to pursuit a life of crime after meeting with his father, who has been incarcerated for the last 30 years.