Léa Garcia

The 43rd edition screens Neighbors, with five segments about the theme “neighbors”: not only about physical proximity, but also about relationships. In Brazil, Olga is a 90-year-old black woman who lost her husband one year ago; her neighbors, who come from different parts of the world, interrupt her grief. In Russia, an employee tries so hard to please his boss that he becomes inconvenient. An Indian woman, with the help of her male friend, decides to learn how to drive, an uncommon practice for women in the country. In China, an elderly, owner of an old and decadent barbershop, argues with his son, who wants to change the business. In South Africa, a group of homeless fights for the right to housing.

Young lovers Orfeu and Eurydice run through the favelas of Rio during Carnaval, on the lam from a hitman dressed like Death and Orfeu's vengeful fiancée Mira and passing between moments of fantasy and stark reality. This impressionistic retelling of the Greek legend of Orpheus and Eurydice introduced bossa nova to the world with its soundtrack by young Brazilian composers Luiz Bonfá and Antonio Carlos Jobim.

For Lete, only excess can bring back the memories she does not want to forget. But if you take away the illusion of a person, only emptiness remains.

A Deusa Negra is a love story that spans two centuries. In 18th century Yorubaland, Prince Oluyole is taken prisoner in the course of internecine warfare fanned by overseas slave traders. He is sold into slavery in Brazil. In present day Nigeria, at his father's deathbed, the young Babatunde promises to go to Brazil and search for traces of their once-enslaved ancestors. Beginning with a Candomblé ritual, his journey takes him ever deeper into this culture and, in a dream-like sequence, affords him a deeper understanding of his ancestors' suffering and powers of resistance. Balogun effortlessly links present with past, real with magical worlds and discourse with trance. The hypnotic atmosphere is also heightened by the music of the Nigerian drummer Remi Kabaka, which plays with repetitive patterns and distortions.

In a Brazilian coastal village where everything seems motionless, Clarice grasps her life in a single day, unlike those she meets and who are living this day like any other. She tries to understand her obscure reality and the destiny of the people around her in a circular time that haunts and disorients.

Three lives linked by a tragic fate try to find a way out of despair.

An illiterate lady seeks to soothe the missing of her son asking for a friend to read several times the same unique and old letter sent by her son ten years ago. Through these readings , a great friendship and complicity were born between them.

After being collected from the dressing room of the Candomblé center, Ana shares her desires, memories, dreams, and reflections with the viewer through a diary.

In Brazil, a diamond prospector sets out in pursuit of a thief who has robbed him and left him for dead. Along the way, he meets one of his adversary's former mistresses and tries to extract some information from her.

With his mom's salon on the brink of bankruptcy, a dedicated son rolls up his sleeves to help and discovers himself as the coolest barber on the block.

In a small town in the State of Minas Gerais, Brazil, two sisters meet again after years apart.

Jorge de Oliveira is an Afro-Brazilian poet who works in a publicity agency in São Paulo. Torn between his rich white lovers and his black family and friends, Jorge's situation serves as a springboard to a discussion about racial issues in Brazil.

Cai na Noite na Pavuna: While Bob revisits his past with a childhood friend, little Augusto and his grandmother follow on TV a vote that will change the course of Brazil.

The new Brazilian cinematic movement (Cinema Novo) through films starring actors Antonio Pitanga and Luiza Maranhão.

The discovery of the existence of death awakens in Omar and Taú the perception that childhood is no longer what it used to be. The grandmother's imminent departure at home reveals to the Ibeji the heritage of this awareness as an ancestral meaning of life.

"A Day with Jerusa" follows Silvia, a young, mediumic market researcher facing the hardships of underemployment while awaiting the result of a public exam, and Jerusa, a gracious 77-year-old lady, eyewitness to the daily life on Bixiga, a neighborhood filled with ancestral memories. On Jerusa's birthday, while she waits for her family's arrival, the encounter between her deepest memories and Silvia's mediumship allows them to travel through time and realities common to their ancestry.

Juca, a black kid, sees his friends and his mother being hit by his stepfather, without being able to do anything against it, but when he knows that he is the great-grandson of João Cândido, the leader of the sailors rebellion against the chibata hits adopted by Brazilian Navy till 1910, he takes an extreme attitude towards changing the course of his life.

Tati, an introspective 13 year old girl struggles to connect with her estranged father, Jaca, after he is released from prison in the turbulent wake of the Rio Olympics. As Brazilian Pacification Police battle to maintain a tenuous occupation of the surrounding Rio favelas, Tati and Jaca must navigate the clashing forces threatening to derail their hope for the future.

Human cloning. The Islamic world. Two young people, two different cultures, two different beliefs. An impossible love story that not even time could erase. During a trip to Morocco, Lucas has a forbidden romance with Jade. He returns to Brazil after the death of his twin brother Diogo. A close family friend, scientist Albieri uses this situation to produce the first human clone using cells taken from Lucas. Twenty years later, Jade, Lucas and his clone form an odd love triangle.

Set in 19th-century Brazil during the waning years of slavery, Escrava Isaura tells the story of Isaura, a white-skinned enslaved woman raised with the manners and education of a noble lady. Though treated with affection by her mistress, Isaura remains legally enslaved and becomes the object of obsessive desire by Leôncio Almeida, the cruel heir to the plantation. After the death of her protector, Isaura falls under Leôncio’s control. Despite his attempts to seduce and dominate her, she resists, determined to preserve her dignity and freedom. Her father, Miguel, helps her escape to Recife, where she adopts a new identity and meets Álvaro, a wealthy and principled abolitionist who falls in love with her. Leôncio eventually tracks her down, leading to dramatic confrontations. In the end, Álvaro rescues Isaura by purchasing Leôncio’s debts, securing her freedom and affirming the story’s central themes of justice, love, and resistance against oppression.

Amidst an unresolved crime, Simone protects Cristiano and falls in love with him. However, the couple faces ambition and betrayals that tear them apart. Presumed dead, she returns under a new identity seeking revenge.

Marina is raised by her father on an island after her mother's death. As a teenager, she moves to Rio de Janeiro to study and live with her godparents, where she ends up falling in love with Marcelo.

Patricia, an orphan living in a traveling amusement park, believes the stars will bring her happiness. One day, an astrologer predicts the impossible: the young woman, an Aquarius, will fall in love with a Pisces boy, a sign initially incompatible with hers. The girl does, in fact, become enchanted by the wealthy student Renato, but he doesn't feel the same way. Patricia travels to Rio de Janeiro, where she befriends a gentleman whom she affectionately calls Mr. Pepe, unaware that he is Renato's great-uncle and the owner of the company where she begins working. Mr. Pepe discovers fraudulent activities committed by his family and decides to fake his death to observe the dispute over his inheritance.

Ambitious Nice seeks social advancement through Rodrigo Medeiros, but ends up truly falling in love with him. This is the second version of the telenovela, originally aired in 1976.

Waldomiro Cerqueira is a powerful businessman who built his empire exploiting mineral deposits and suddenly finds himself under threat of losing it due to family conflicts.

In the backlands, the drover Ricardo marks the destiny of young Maria. Years later, in Xique-Xique, a mistake between two identical women rekindles passions, separations, and an impossible love.

The plot takes place in a fictional city called Vale do Café, where two powerful families, the Toledo and Fontes, are locked in an intense dispute for power and land ownership. Conflicts are marked by betrayals, forbidden loves and dark secrets. The soap opera addresses themes such as ambition, revenge, romance and conflicts between families, showing the fire that consumes the land and human relationships.

At her birthday party, a little girl disappears and her family is left desperate. Years later, their hope returns in the form of a seaside young woman.

Mikhael is a sergeant in charge of BOPE, always on dangerous missions in Rio de Janeiro. But after getting involved in a controversial operation that culminated to a slaughter, he is transferred to a police unit at the state countryside.

Amidst an unresolved crime, Simone protects Cristiano and falls in love with him. However, the couple faces ambition and betrayals that tear them apart. Presumed dead, she returns under a new identity seeking revenge.