Movies: Héctor Babenco

The first of four installments in the groundbreaking Heartbeat of the World anthology film series. Comprised of several short films by some of the world's most exciting directors, Words with Gods follows the theme of religion - specifically as it rel...

Roland is an avant-garde artist in Venice, California whose sister lives on their family's estate in Venice, Italy. Their father is near death and announces that his home and priceless collection of art have been bequeathed to the Italian government....

Fictional story based on Sarah Bernhard's visit to Brazil in 1905. The actress, experiencing a personal and professional crisis at the time, is induced by her personal Brazilian maid, Amélia, to make a performance in Rio de Janeiro. After arriving, s...

Martin and Hazel Quarrier are small-town fundamentalist missionaries sent to the jungles of South America to convert the Indians. Their remote mission was previously run by the Catholics, before the natives murdered them all. They are sent by the pom...

When a Spanish Jesuit goes into the South American wilderness to build a mission in the hope of converting the Indians of the region, a slave hunter is converted and joins his mission. When Spain sells the colony to Portugal, they are forced to defen...

When a doctor decides to carry out an AIDS prevention program inside Latin America’s largest prison: the Casa de Detenção de São Paulo - Carandiru, he meets the future victims of one of the darkest days in Brazilian History when the State of São Paul...

The story of two couples - Xico and Olga, Tuca and Dina - through 20 years of friendship, from adolescent dreams to maturity frustrations. They meet in a small town in the State of São Paulo, but one of the couples decides to try their luck in the bi...

Seventy critics and filmmakers discuss cinema around the conflict between the artist and the observer, the creator and the critic. Between 1998 and 2007, Kléber Mendonça Filho recorded testimonies about this relationship in Brazil, the United States ...

Besieged by cancer and nearing the end, the genius Argentine-Brazilian filmmaker Héctor Babenco (1946-2016) asks Bárbara Paz, his wife, for one last wish: to be the protagonist of his own death....

An alcoholic drifter spends Halloween in his hometown of Albany, New York after returning there for the first time in decades....

A chronicle of the personal life and public career of the celebrated artist and filmmaker Julian Schnabel....

The story of two radically different men thrown together in a Latin American prison cell. One is Valentin, a journalist being tortured for his political beliefs. The other is Molina, a gay window-dresser who fills their lonely nights by spinning roma...

Spanning several decades, this powerful biopic offers a glimpse into the life of famed Cuban poet and novelist Reinaldo Arenas, an artist who was vilified for his homosexuality in Fidel Castro's Cuba....

Three metropolitan stories entwine in São Paulo. Would-be actress Marina arrives in the city looking for independence, falls madly in love with Justine, a bisexual rock singer, and is swept up into her wild, edgy lifestyle. Marina shares a flat on Av...

Mauro Mateus dos Santos was known by another name: Sabotage. Growing up amidst poverty in São Paulo, the musician, who became a legend after his death, is one of the most important names in national rap....

10-year-old Pixote endures torture, degradation, and corruption at a local youth detention center where two of its members are murdered by policemen who frame Lilica, a 17-year-old trans hustler. Pixote helps Lilica and three other boys escape and th...

A tribute documentary on Fernando Ramos da Silva, the famous child star of the acclaimed film by Hector Babenco, "Pixote, a Lei do Mais Fraco" (1981). 20 years after his assassination by the police, his co-stars and Babenco talk about Fernando's cont...

An abandoned tumbledown theater in the outback of Paraíba state is the initial setting of a film about cinema, which explores the testimonials of the novelist and playwright Ariano Suassuna and other filmmakers such as Ruy Guerra, Julio Bressane, Ken...

In the 1940s, São Paulo nightlife is the setting for Tezinho's love affairs. In love with Aninha, he needs to get away from the girl and ends up getting involved with other women, including an obsessive relationship with a prostitute....

The historical, political, and social context of Brazil in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s, and the impact of each decade on the life and work of the acclaimed actress Marília Pêra....