Vânia Catani

Pequenas Criaturas

A family moves to the futuristic capital of Brazil and the father is called away on a business trip, leaving behind an upset wife, a pissed-off teenager and a pathologically optimistic 8-year-old who believes in more than the eye can see.

Trouble in Paradise – The Myth of Motherhood

Maternity is instinctive or is it a social construction? How can a period surrounded by expectations of happiness and achievement be, at the same time, such an anticlimax, so exhausting and melancholy? A director-mother talks to other mothers about the maternal instinct, guilt and loneliness, reflecting on the complexities and riches of maternity.

Serial Kelly

Kelly is an electronic forró singer in search of ascension. She does shows in the backlands of Brazil, but does not have many opportunities. For her career to become a success, she ends up killing some people along the way. Investigated for the murder of three men, she uses her itinerant presentations as an escape tool as she becomes known as Serial Kelly.

Fogaréu

On the border between the real and the fantastic, between the colonial past and the overwhelming modernity of agribusiness, the city of Goiás is the scene of the meeting between the young Fernanda and her secret roots. She returns to the home of her wealthy uncle, after the death of her adoptive mother, in order to implode the certainties and to reveal the painful truth about its origin.

Fogaréu

On the border between the real and the fantastic, between the colonial past and the overwhelming modernity of agribusiness, the city of Goiás is the scene of the meeting between the young Fernanda and her secret roots. She returns to the home of her wealthy uncle, after the death of her adoptive mother, in order to implode the certainties and to reveal the painful truth about its origin.

Wigudun

According to data collected in colonial chronicles from the 15th and 17th centuries, several American Indian peoples consider gender to be non-binary, male or female; on the contrary, diversity was the rule in Panama: the Guna people identified the Omeggids as belonging to a third gender, which leads to something beyond sexual orientation or eroticism. Nandin, Yineth, Rosario and Débora are some of the members of the Wigudun Galu group, whose name refers to an Omeggid entity from Guna mythology. They define themselves as a separate group, and their demands are specific to that group. They seek visibility, and their fight is arduous, as they are indigenous, they are trans and they are Omeggids. Broken down inside and outside your community.

Medusa

By day, Mari and her friends broadcast their spiritual devotion through pastel pinks and catchy evangelical songs about purity and perfection, and by night they form a vigilante girl gang, prowling the streets in search of sinners who have deviated from the rightful path. After an attack goes wrong, leaving Mari scarred and unemployed, her views of community, religion, and her peers begin to shift.

All Paulos in the World - Paulo José

"All Paulos in the World" is a cinematographic essay about Paulo José, one of the greatest artists in Brazil, in the year in which he turns 80 years-old.

Zama

In a remote South American colony in the late 18th century, officer Zama of the Spanish crown waits in vain for a transfer to a more prestigious location. He suffers small humiliations and petty politicking as he increasingly succumbs to lust and paranoia.

The Movie of My Life

The sierras of southern Brazil, 1963. The son of an French man and a Brazilian woman, Tony is a young man with a profound love of cinema and poetry. After graduating from college he returns to his small town in rural Brazil, to find out that his father had left for good, back to France. Tony then looks for the company of his fathers friends in search of information and references of a lost male role-model. He becomes a school teacher and a male figure to kids, in an attempt to provide them with something he lacks himself. A series of developments lead him to a surprising final lead on his fathers' whereabouts and reasons for leaving.

The Movie of My Life

The sierras of southern Brazil, 1963. The son of an French man and a Brazilian woman, Tony is a young man with a profound love of cinema and poetry. After graduating from college he returns to his small town in rural Brazil, to find out that his father had left for good, back to France. Tony then looks for the company of his fathers friends in search of information and references of a lost male role-model. He becomes a school teacher and a male figure to kids, in an attempt to provide them with something he lacks himself. A series of developments lead him to a surprising final lead on his fathers' whereabouts and reasons for leaving.

Whirlpool

Luzimar cycles each day to and from work at the local cotton mill in his hometown of Cataguases, Minas Gerais, Brazil. He is a hard-working man, trying to make the most of what he has. One day, his childhood friend Gildo reappears, driving a fancy car and boasting of his successful life in São Bernardo do Campo, São Paulo. As the two sit down for a beer, memories, regrets and old resentments slowly resurface.

Deserto

A small group of artists travels the Brazilian backlands presenting a show. Upon arriving in a small village, they find an abandoned city with houses, a church, and a fountain spouting clean water, like a miracle of a biblical desert. Tired of and battered by their life as wanderers, the artists decide to settle in the village and start a new community, assigning themselves different roles from those they have played throughout their lives. This new arrangement, however, will reveal these artists the worst vices of the civilian life.

Kill Me Please

Barra da Tijuca, West Side Zone of Rio de Janeiro. A wave of murderers plague the area. What starts off as a morbid curiosity for the local youth, slowly begins to spoil away at their lives. Among them is Bia, a 15-year-old girl. After an encounter with death, she will do anything to make sure she is alive.

Lyrics

In the short end of pregnancy, a samba singer sees herself shared between two men that believes to be the father of her baby. Duelling men: a militiaman, a hacker and Shirley, a cross-dresser, best friend of the singer, who really plays the role of head on that family. Dreams, love, jealousy, life and death. Like in our songs.

Billi Pig

The aspiring actress Marivalda, her husband Wanderley, a bankrupt insurance broker and a false priest do their best to get along in life. But they end up in the hands of a drug boss, whose daughter they promised to save the life of, hit in a shooting at a party in São Cristóvão. A huge cash reward is at stake and now all three have to chase the promised miracle.

Billi Pig

The aspiring actress Marivalda, her husband Wanderley, a bankrupt insurance broker and a false priest do their best to get along in life. But they end up in the hands of a drug boss, whose daughter they promised to save the life of, hit in a shooting at a party in São Cristóvão. A huge cash reward is at stake and now all three have to chase the promised miracle.

País do Desejo

Roberta is a renowned classical pianist battling a chronic kidney disease. However, an unexpected encounter with Father José will forever change her life.

País do Desejo

Roberta is a renowned classical pianist battling a chronic kidney disease. However, an unexpected encounter with Father José will forever change her life.

Balzac's Last Novel

Documentary about the reminiscence of Balzac's works, spiritually and scientifically the documentary shows the strenght of this important work of French literature through the years.

The Clown

The life of the owners of Circus Esperança, Puro Sangue e Pangaré, father and son, who plays two clowns. At a certain point, Pangaré starts showing tiredness and sadness for being an unhappy clown.

At the Wrong Place

Four friends are reunited in a night that is moved by a game of lies and truth with unexpected consequences. This movie is based on the theatrical play “Eutro” directed by Rodrigo Fischer.

The Dead Girl's Feast

"The Dead Girl's Feast" narrates the story of Santinho, a young man who has been exalted to the position of a saint in a remote riverine community of the upper Amazonas state, after performing a “miracle” upon the suicide of his own mother. The film seeks to be an intimate picture of the ones who are involved in this sect and of the infinite human capacity of “fabricating” faith and seeking for some sense in the horrifying experience of death.

December

Caio is 40 years old and lives in the Rio de Janeiro's countryside, where he owns a scrap-metal yard. On Christmas' Eve, he goes to the capital to visit his family and friends. Finally he will be able to meet a man he has not seen for a long time: himself.

Favela on Blast

For 20 years, a subculture has emerged in Brazil under society's radar. It is the culture surrounding 'funk carioca', a musical rhythm which mixes the American electronic funk of the 1980s with the most diverse influences of Brazilian music. 'Baile funk' is one of the most interesting musical movements in the world, but it comes from what is at times one of the most violent and poorest places in the world: the slums of Rio de Janeiro (favelas). This music is the personalization of the raw element. Bombastic rhythms coming from the American Miami Bass and samples are fused with powerful rap vocals using Brazilian slang. This documentary tells stories of sex, love, poverty, and pride among Rio's marginalized people. They have their own language, style, and heroes. It's a film that's fast, heavy, and violent like the city itself.

The Storytellers

A small poor community called Javé is under threat of being flooded by a new dam that is being built, and the only way to prevent this is to prove the town's historical value. As most of the inhabitants are illiterate, they have no choice but to ask for the help of Antônio Biá, a man who has been ostracized ever since it was discovered that he had sent out letters with lies about their reputations as a way to keep his job in Javé's seldom-used post office. He now has the task of documenting people's memories of how the city was founded, yet each inhabitant has his or her own version of what happened.

The Storytellers

A small poor community called Javé is under threat of being flooded by a new dam that is being built, and the only way to prevent this is to prove the town's historical value. As most of the inhabitants are illiterate, they have no choice but to ask for the help of Antônio Biá, a man who has been ostracized ever since it was discovered that he had sent out letters with lies about their reputations as a way to keep his job in Javé's seldom-used post office. He now has the task of documenting people's memories of how the city was founded, yet each inhabitant has his or her own version of what happened.

The End of the Endless

"Fim do Sem Fim" is a feature-length documentary that has as its backdrop the imminent disappearance of certain trades and professions in Brazil. Shot in 10 Brazilian states, the film is a dive into the inventiveness and resistance of men in the face of technological and cultural changes.