From Aluízio Abranches, director of The Three Marias, this lush family drama of taboo romance is the story of two young half brothers whose intense childhood bond becomes tangled up in adult infatuation. Love is complicated. But it’s rarely this complicated.
Francisco, twelve, and Thomas, six, share an unbreakable and unusual bond. As the brothers grow up, their intimacy, while innocent, begins to concern the adults around them as being inappropriate. Oblivious to the adults’ suspicion, the boys are happy, their love only full of protective fraternal affection.
Fifteen years later, on the night of their mother’s funeral, the brothers — now fully grown — are alone together. With nothing left to lose or hide, they find comfort in each others’ arms, fulfilling a desire they’d denied themselves since childhood. The honeymoon is passionate and brief, as their relationship is put to the test when younger brother Thomas is invited to train for the Olympics in Russia for three years. Having never been apart, can their forbidden love withstand the separation?
Brazilian audiences flocked to this controversial and complicated film before it hit the international film circuit. The adult brothers (played by athletic and model-beautiful Joao Gabriel Vasconcello and Rafael Cardoso) radiate heat and chemistry, and Abranches’ poetic tone moves the film away from sensationalism toward intimate authenticity. –Frameline
