Alan Minas

THE DIONTI FAMILY is a lyrical family drama, infused with magic realism, about a father and the two sons he is bringing up alone. It depicts a striking part of the Brazilian countryside, rarely seen in cinema and tells a universally engaging tale about first love, loss and personal transformation.

Luiza, a shy, awkward 15 year-old girl from Rio, dreams of being an artist. Her life is just starting to make sense when Luiza's world falls apart when her mother suffers an acute schizophrenic episode. Determined to hold her family together, Luiza must find the strength to face fear, loneliness and discrimination as she takes over the household and her mother's care.

You Didn’t Know About Me proposes a filmic narrative to 7 characters, all with serious mental commitments. The themes presented are free: childhood, nostalgia and loneliness. The scripts elaborated are based on memories and experiences lived by the characters. The condition of invisibility, prejudice and stigmatisation is flagrant in the documentary’s narratives. The way the documentary is made exposes its making: the team and the director are unfolding as characters. At this stage, it is evident how the authors fictionalise personal stories from their past. The inter-dimensional perception of the narratives configures polyphonic plots, with forces in constant tension: directed with the most intimate for each character, and advancing to contemporary political and social issues. The plot surprises by this alternation of narrative focus, it manages to converge on themes that permeate everyone, and are common to all humanity, because of their poetic and existentialist character.