Apocalypse in the Tropics

A documentary about the relationship between evangelical Christianity and politics in Brazil. Forty years ago it was five per cent of the population; today it is over thirty, and a force that decides elections. Petra Costa directs. At the centre is the televangelist Silas Malafaia. Costa obtained extended access to him, and the camera records him at the pulpit, in the car and talking to politicians. She describes him as a Rasputin figure beside Bolsonaro, the man who consolidated the evangelical vote into a bloc and placed that bloc behind a candidate. The documentary also contains direct interviews with Jair Bolsonaro and Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, and that access is its most striking feature. Costa's method combines personal narration with archive. She used the same structure in The Edge of Democracy, which was nominated for an Oscar. The question is political rather than theological: how does a faith organised around the expectation of the end regard democratic institutions, and why does it treat an election result as provisional. It screened out of competition at Venice on 29 August 2024, had a limited US release on 11 July 2025 and went out on Netflix on 14 July 2025. Who it is for: viewers interested in Brazilian politics and in the relationship between religion and power. Who it is not for: the film takes an open side and gives no room to the internal variety of the evangelical community.