'O Projeto': Colonialism Road Movie Hits Brazil Before Pivotal Election

A six-year-old documentary about colonialism reaches São Paulo audiences this week, days before Brazil's second-round presidential vote on Sunday, Oct. 25. Brazilian filmmaker Sabrina Fidalgo and Swiss photographer Yvan Rodic premiere "O Projeto" at the Mostra de São Paulo, fresh from its festival debut at the Gramado Film Festival earlier this year.

The film, whose title translates literally as "The Project," is a documentary road movie spanning Brazil, Germany and Switzerland. It stitches together archival material, first-person interviews with thinkers such as Grada Kilomba and Djamila Ribeiro, and poetic interludes to examine the visible and invisible scars of more than six centuries of colonialism.

How did the film come together?

The project was born during the early days of the pandemic, after the Black Lives Matter protests in the U.S. convinced the duo the moment had arrived. "O Projeto" holds a distinction: it was the first Brazilian project ever supported by the Le Fonds de Dotation agnès b., the philanthropic fund created by fashion designer Agnès Troublé.

Development was grueling. Fidalgo described the obstacles to Variety: "It was tricky because we first began working on the project during the pandemic, and still under the Bolsonaro government, at a time when all resources were frozen; we no longer had a Ministry of Culture and our national film fund was practically nonexistent." The road-movie format compounded the problem, since travel was restricted; the filmmakers spent the early years in development conversations with each other and with producers at Gullane.

Who is backing the film?

The documentary has drawn high-profile champions. "Brainstorm" director Laís Bodanzky joined as associate producer, while Oscar-winning "I'm Still Here" director Walter Salles is an ongoing supporter. "Rarely have I seen the issues of colonialism and whiteness addressed with such relevance," Salles said in a statement. "It is a polyphonic, proactive, and, at the same time, incisive film. It is very well directed and edited."

The pairing of the two filmmakers is itself the film's core. Rodic acknowledged the scope felt daunting but said the "magic" lay in their differing perspectives joined by a "strong connection." "We shared cultural references, and we loved talking about the subject, too," he said. "It was tricky at times, but those very complications led to a very singular film."

Fidalgo framed it as the project's origin: "This is the very genesis of the film: how can two people who are in theory so different think the consequences of the colonial project from within their specific perspectives?" She noted that "Yvan is a white Swiss man from the global north, I'm a Black Brazilian woman from the global south, but there are many things that unite us."

Why does the timing matter?

The São Paulo screening lands as Brazil braces for a tense runoff between President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Flávio Bolsonaro, son of former president Jair Bolsonaro. Fidalgo called the election "a choice between good and evil" and described "O Projeto" as "not just a film, it's a manifesto," tying its images of Black Lives Matter protests to current mobilizations in France, Spain and the U.S. "We believe people will leave the screening room with a renewed desire to go to the streets and avoid the catastrophe of another Bolsonaro government," she said.

Produced by Gullane, Fidalgo Produções, Globo Filmes and Canal Brasil, in association with Yvan Rodic Media, "O Projeto" opens in Brazilian theaters on Nov. 19. Fidalgo's next step is "Carnaval," a fiction feature now in development that closes a trilogy begun with "Queen" (2016) and "Lavender" (2019), set among women preparing a carnival parade in the late 1990s.