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Sisters

Marianna Brennand Fortes

Producer

Carolina Benevides

Lab Edition

9

,

2021

Production

Country

Brazil

SYNOPSIS

Synopsis
Marcielle, 13, lives with her parents and siblings in a remote shack on the banks of an Amazonian river. Her mom wants Marcielle to start working the barges and help put food on the table. Knowing that it entails being sexually exploited, her father is dead against it. However, this apparent fatherly protection hides something darker - he is sexually abusing his daughter. Marcielle fights this reality but when her sister is at risk, she must make an impossible choice

DIRECTOR'S NOTE

Director’s Note
What fascinates me in cinema is the potential to encounter the “other” and how it enables us to see, feel and live in someone else’s shoes. This is why I will have an absolute protagonist, Marcielle – we will be radically on her point of view, seeing only what she sees and hearing only what she hears. As a filmmaker, I want to increase public awareness for such a painful subject matter as sexual abuse of women, especially children and adolescents. In terms of plot, I chose a , a classic narrative with tremendous visual power. Although the abuse scenes are never shown on screen, my intention is to show in a poetic way how the violence impacts on the character perception. Marcielle experiences many conflicts and the film will be with her in her moment of conscious awareness. In the photography I want to show the contrast of the beauty and richness of the region's natural landscape with Marcielle's poor and sad reality. The lush forest with abundant water can be as arid as a desert. A very cinematic environment that hides the unspoken "rules" of its inhabitants. For that “Sisters” will be shot on location, in a riverside community in Amazon Region where this story takes place. Actors’ direction will benefit from that because I’ll be working with actors that will be able to dive into the universe of the film and non-actors that will be comfortable in their habitat. Female characters who interact with Marcielle, will help her to see that is not normal what she is been through and that is possible to put an end to the cycle of abuse. The film will be generous to its characters and their stories, in terms of the length of scenes that reflect the way in which time, and distance, in that part of the world, imprisons its inhabitants.

ABOUT THE FILMMAKER

PRODUCER

Carolina Benevides

Producer, co-writer
Carolina Benevides, Brazil 
Carolina Benevides is the executive producer at Inquietude where she develops documentaries, features and series. Among them I Am Carlos Imperial (2015), and Darn Good (2016), (Best Film, Cine PE). Benevides was production coordinator on The Eye of the Storm (Cannes, 2009), and Passerby (Best 1st film Guadalajara, 2010). In 2020 she released the documentary series Festival’s Nights for cable TV.

​PRODUCTION COMPANY PROFILE

Production Company
Inquietude, Recife, Brazil
carolina@inquietude.art.br
+55 21 991940062

​PRODUCTION BUDGET

Production Budget
$1.230.541
Secured funds:
$545.454,55 FSA/ Brazilian Cinema Agency Prize; $365.470,21Globo Filmes / Co-producer through Audiovisual Law; $85.818,18 Private investors through Audiovisual Law; $51.980,15 Direct funds from the producer; $181.818,18 GAP

LANGUAGE

Portuguese

GENRE

Drama

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