Entre o Amor e a Razão

A coroner reunites with a great love from the past, realizing that the memories are more vivid than ever.

After 20 years missing, João Grilo returns to Taperoá to join his old friend Chicó and, after his story of resurrection spreads, he is disputed as an electoral candidate by the two most powerful politicians in the city.

Amid the 2019 drought in Brazil’s Northeast, Madalena loses her mother in a tragic event that changes her life. Alone, she joins a rebellion at the Grajaú farm in Canudos, where a community rises against government neglect. A violent State response turns their hope into sorrow. Later, journalist Júlia returns to uncover the truth, hearing from people like Lúcia, a grieving mother. As Júlia investigates, hidden stories emerge: Madalena's forbidden love with rebel João and Pedro's thirst for revenge after losing his father to political violence. Their paths cross in a tale of justice, pain, and redemption. Inspired by Ariano Suassuna, famed for "A Dog’s Will", this short film is a prelude to "A Pena e a Lei", created by 9th-grade students from Escola SESI Cambona, in Maceió, Brazil. It was screened at the SESI Festival of Art and Culture in July 2023, touching audiences with its emotional and socially conscious narrative.

An elegant dinner, which takes place in real time, brings together a group of intellectuals in the early 90s in São Paulo, Brazil: the hosts are the editor of the country's top news magazine and her husband, the company's lawyer, and the occasion is the wedding anniversary of the magazine publisher and his wife, a famous theater actress. The publisher has written an open letter to the president of the country, with serious denunciations, which will run in the upcoming issue. He risks being arrested this very evening. As tensions increase with the imminence of prison, secrets come to light revealing the conflict between the ethics sought in public life and the ethics practiced in private life.

When bandits take the town of Sertânia, Antão gets shot, arrested, and left to die. Bleeding out, Antão's delirious mind begins to recall the events that led up to the incident through a sequence of increasingly unreliable fever dreams.