Midnight

A film that takes place over one night in Rio de Janeiro. It is the last day of 1999. The city is waiting for the new millennium, there are preparations in the streets and two separate stories move toward the same night. The first begins in a prison. João is let out; something is expected of him in return, and whether he will do it stays uncertain through the night. The second is in an apartment. Maria is a teacher; the man she lived with has left her and she is alone at home, having decided how the night will end. The two lines cross on the roof of a building. What the film is interested in is not the celebration but the people left outside it: while the fireworks go off the camera stays on faces. It was made as part of a series for French television; films about the turn of the millennium were commissioned from directors in different countries, and the Brazilian one was made by Walter Salles together with Daniela Thomas. Fernanda Torres plays Maria and Luiz Carlos Vasconcelos plays João. Matheus Nachtergaele is in the cast. The photography never shows the city as a tourist would see it; throughout, Rio is narrow streets and rooftops. Who it is for: anyone who likes Brazilian cinema and stories set across a single night. Who it is not for: anyone expecting pace; the film runs under seventy minutes and is still not fast, and it does not try to explain either of its characters.