If I Were Alive

A middle-class Black family in Brazil copes with the election of a far-right extremist president. The mother believes that she's cursed after an unexpected encounter, while her husband puts all of his hopes into their son's soccer career.

After having invaded liquid, gaseous and solid substances, a strange voice takes possession of a woman's body and for the first time experiences the taste of something truly human. Together, the voice and the body seek for belonging and an identity of their own as they question their roles within society.

A man waits on the top of his house's roof with his friend. They are talking to each other until this friend realises something quite strange.

Another day in the life of an elderly couple in the suburbs.

In order to take a new job as an employee in the public sanitation department, Juliana moves from the inner city of Itaúna to the metropolitan town of Contagem in Brazil. While waiting for her husband to join her, she adapts to her new life, meeting people and discovering new horizons, trying to overcome her past.

Zeca tries to get up early to catch the bus and arrive an hour and a half later at the neighboring town’s school, where he works as a librarian. Waking up early is evermore difficult: something prevents him from maintaining his routine. One day, Zeca meets Louisa.

Maria José Novais Oliveira, a black woman, resident on the outskirts of Contagem, already in her 60s, has become a film actress, with an award-winning career in Brazil and internationally. This documentary recalls the image of a unique woman who marked Brazilian cinema in the 2010s.

Andre and Elida are dating for a short time. In real life and in fiction.

With its obvious simplicity, the film’s title happens to set the mood of the film, or at least its guiding principle: staying anchored in everyday life. More precisely, the life of Maria José and Norberto, who have been married for 35 years and who live in Contagem, in the suburbs of Belo Horizonte. Their marriage is on the rocks, which leads their two sons to also wonder about the future of their own relationships with their wives. The story is quite ordinary. How can one capture such an impercep- tible shift in the heart of the banality of things, only made more noticeable by a crisis? Filming his own family, his own parents, his brother and himself, André Novais Oliveira has chosen to take his time. He shots long sequences, leaving enough time for the fictional situations on which he puts his characters to grow and unfold. Then he uses wide frames to linger on more mundane, concrete or at times farcical moments: eating an orange, cooking, watching television...

The inhabitants of the Brazilian city of Contagem yearn for a better life. At the core of it all is Selma, a woman dreaming about the heart of the world: it could be anywhere, as long as it's a place where to feel happier.

An event, four people and the city of Contagem.

The story of a family who has their lives crushed by the tragedy of the floods in Mariana (Minas Gerais, Brazil)

In 2011, during a blackout in an outskirt neighborhood’s street, a family – surrounded by candles that light conversations and thoughts – awaits the return of electricity. Now, ten years later, the light tries to impose its place towards the shadows of memory.

Dona Sônia seeks revenge for the death of her only son.