Director: Gabriel Mascaro

Star: Denise Weinberg, Rodrigo Santoro, Miriam Socorrás,

A sense of renewed possibility runs through director-co-writer Macaro’s otherwise dystopian sci-fi drama. The setting is near future Brazil where the elderly are sent away to living facilities to avoid hindering their offsprings’ productivity. Graffiti hints at the darker nature of the facilities. Single-minded Tereza (Weinberg), who works in an alligator meat factory, has reached that fateful age. Just as Tereza is about to be bussed off after being issued with nappies and a rucksack by the unnervingly cheerful government employees, she sneaks away into the Amazon jungle. A scruffy boatman Cadu (Santoro) offers to take her upriver for a hefty price. En route, Cadu teaches Tereza how to drive the boat, while he samples the titular blue trail of a snail, which when dropped in the eye causes hallucinations. Later Tereza meets fellow elderly woman Roberta (Socarras), a cheerfully disreputable atheist who sells electronic bibles from her boat. A close life-altering friendship develops. Clocking in at an economic eighty-six minutes this is part parable, part trippy voyage of discovery, with Mascaro delivering some darkly funny digs at upbeat corporate messaging. Cinematographer Guillermo Garza’s renderings of the Amazon interiors are beautiful and surreal, with Memo Guerra’s retro-futuristic score compounding the strangeness.

David Willoughby

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