Yonlu

Hique Montanari's 2017 Brazilian film is adapted from a real life. Vinicius Gageiro Marques was a sixteen-year-old who posted music online under the name Yonlu; he spoke five languages and had virtual friends across the world. In the same period he was taking part in a forum for people considering suicide. The film tells that duality. From outside Yonlu appears gifted and connected; at the same time he is carrying on another conversation somewhere he tells nobody about. That the internet can be both a lifeline and a danger sits at the centre. The telling is calm and built on music; Yonlu's actual recordings are used. The film does not try to alter the outcome or dramatise it; it leaves what happened as it was. Who it's for: those able to watch drama adapted from real lives and accounts of internet culture. Who it's not for: viewers who do not want to approach suicide or who could be affected by it; the film addresses it directly.