Fernanda Torres and Walter Salles, ‘I’m Still Here’

0:12Hello and welcome to the Monaco Weekly. For this week's show, I had the immense pleasure to speak with Brazilian actress Fernanda Torres and Brazilian director Walter Salles on their film I'm Still Here, which is already one of the most successful Brazilian films ever and has been nominated for three Oscars, including Best Picture and Best Actress for Torres. It's a sensational film telling the story of Eunice Paiva, turned activist after the disappearance of her husband in the country's military dictatorship. Here is my conversation with both Fernanda Torres and Walter Salles.

1:05Walter Salles and Fernanda Torres, what a pleasure. As a Brazilian, I'm very happy you've just been nominated for the Golden Globes as well. But let's talk about I'm Still Here. My first question goes to you, Walter. I want to know your connection, actually, with the story, because it's been based on a book by Marcelo Rubens Paiva, but I know it's very close to your heart, right? Yes, it definitely is personal to me as well. When I was 13 years old, 13, 14, I became friends with this one family, the Paivas. their house somehow became a place very dear to me. It was a place where we could discuss politics, where we heard music all the time.

1:53Somehow what pulsated in it was the possibility of another Brazil because during that time we were living under military dictatorship. And then this house that represented the possibility of light to me was struck by a tragedy. And that family that I knew so well had to find ways to reinvent itself. And the mother of the five kids I was friends with had to find ways to construct a form of resilience and resistance that could allow the family as a whole to go through. so it's really about joy it's about that joy that is robbed and it's about finding ways to go on and living it was very life-affirming in many ways and Fernanda, I wonder if you ever met or how much you knew about Eunice Paiva because as Walter said about the resilience that's the word for the character because she's been through a lot but you can see in her face how she has kids.

3:04She has so much to deal with. It's incredible. But tell us about your connection, actually, with Eunice Spiva. My connection, my first one, was totally because of Marcelo Rubenspaiva when he wrote his first book, and there was this mother, and I also knew that she was the widow of Rubenspaiva, who had been killed, but nobody had the details. Then finally, Marcelo wrote this book, a book where the boy, adult, discovered that his mother is the heroine of the family. And then I watched the interviews, and there was this mysterious woman that in a way guided us throughout the film. She was like persuasive, but always gentle, intelligent.

3:56She always had a smile. And she was never someone who would show off her personality or her desires. She's for real. So then when we started to make this film, from the beginning, Walter was like asking me, I remember the first thing I did, and he said, trust me, less. And he was always reminding me when I forgot about the smile and the subtraction. I think it's a movie that perhaps because he was a documentarist and because he lived in that house, he wanted us to do and to be for real. And she was the guide that guided us in this, I think. That's a wonderful answer. And Walter, of course, the film, the critics loved it.

4:50It's award-winning, nominated. But there is a crazy connection with the Brazilian audience. Everybody's going to see it. And it's being released together with big blockbusters. How does it feel? Because it is a very, perhaps it's a story that Brazilians know very well, close to their hearts from the time. How do you see the audience reaction to it in Brazil? Well, you know, that was the most incredible gift that we received. It was the fact that Brazilians from different generations went to the cinemas to see their own reflection, you know, on the screen and to somehow to unveil a part of Brazilian history that is not in the history books.

5:36And all of that through the microcosm of family, of this one family. So somehow digging on the memory of that family, you also dig on the memory of the country as a whole, you know. And I guess the public recognized that. And as the film was done collectively, they also wanted to see the film collectively. And it was a surprise to see that screenings were completely full and that the film, in a very short amount of time, reached 2.5 million Brazilians, which is truly a lot. But much more important than the numbers is the fact that people go to this film to have a common experience. and then when they exit the theaters, they discuss about themselves, about cinema, about what those characters brought as examples, which is incredible.

6:31I think it brings back the fact that literature, such as Marcelo's book and music, such as the ones that permeate the film from beginning to the end, And then films themselves are really great instruments against oblivion. They allow us not to forget. I see this really as the most beautiful thing that could happen to a film. It's a film that is embraced by the culture that it wants to reflect.

7:16What's going on? My husband is in danger. Everyone is in danger.

7:44And it's related also to my mother because she did this ride. She was in this big ride with Walter 25 years ago. So Brazil saw it like it's not only once. We're going to do it twice. But it's more important than that is that we came from a period where art in Brazil, in the world, but in Brazil was being really attacked. attacked like a dirty thing, like we were corrupted morally, financial and all corrupted, was tough. And the most beautiful thing now is to watch Brazil again, people from all kinds of religions, political beliefs. They are proud, and they are proud of our culture, of our art.

8:40that was like a turning point that this film was able to do now, in this moment. And together, we discovered that we really were in the edge of a coup d 'etat in Brazil when this film was being made. I mean, the last president tried. He had plans, not he, but the plots around him had plans to assassinate the president, the vice president, and the Supreme Court member. So it was happening again. When we're shooting this movie? So to have this movie with people loving it now at the same time that they discover that we're very close to a coup d 'etat, just like that one that we had in 1964, that's really important politically and culturally.

9:39So in some ways, Walter, the film feels as fresh as ever, as current in its themes as well. But I think one thing you do very well in your films, you keep it personal, it is about politics, but I think when you do a personal story of the Paiva family, I think any Brazilian can understand that. If you're from the right, from the left, what do you have to say? I think that Marcelo's book allowed us to understand what loss meant to every single member of his family. You know, so you understand what loss represents through very personal experiences from one of the five kids, but also from the mother's point of view.

10:25I was reading the other day that you can only understand the magnitude of loss when you have experienced joy. And that family was about joy. And then the loss that occurs can be felt in a very singular manner in each one of them. Fernanda's mother, the extraordinary Fernanda Montenegro, I think that teached all of us that every single... When you want to do a film that has a political penchant, you have first to talk about the human experience. So that's the channel. The channel is through the human and the existential. And, you know, with such extraordinary actors as Fernanda Torres and Fernanda Matenegro, you understand what those characters are going through.

11:22And this is how you feel what's going on on a human, but also on a political standpoint. And, Fernanda, how was it to go back? Of course, you're certainly not only a comedy actress, but more recently, Brazilians, you know, they were laughing with you. You did amazing series, I mean, including me. How was it to go back to drama? Did you feel comfortable? Oh, I thought I was lost to drama. No, not really, because I don't separate that much. But, of course, I was doing, I did, like, two TV series that were big, big hits in Brazil, when popularly I was very much a comedian. But of course, I mean, I do theater, I'm also a comedian.

12:11And then Walter decided to give me this gift to do not only drama, but drama in such a profound way, in such a humanistic way. You know, a lot of adolescents now are going to the movies, to the cinema, and they don't know about the dictatorship that much. And they are discovering it through a family that could be theirs. So this humanistic point of view of Eunice Paiva, of Valti, it's very rare. I think it won't happen again. It will take 25 years for this to happen again. I hope it happens again. But I have a final question to both of you. Art in Brazil, are you optimistic for what's happening politically, whatever, but are you optimistic about art in Brazil in general?

13:09I'm never optimistic, and that's my starting point. I don't judge if I'm optimistic because this kind of utopia I think I don't have in life. What Brazil has is a very rich culture. I mean, we like to watch ourselves. We are isolated by language, for sure, but we don't care. And, you know, in a way, you feel pity that you cannot sing, for instance, Construção by Chico Buarque like we do, that you don't know Machado de Assis. So I think culture in Brazil will never die because we have this as a founding character of our country. We're very lucky. I don't know who said that an optimist is somebody who is misinformed about reality.

14:08But I have to say that I am optimistic with the state of Brazilian cinema for one reason, is that we have an extraordinary capacity of resistance. You know, after four years of silence, which were the years of COVID and then the Bolsonaro years, Brazilian cinema has come back very rapidly with great first-time director films, you know, that received prizes in Cannes and received prizes in Venice, with a number of documentary and fiction films that are truly excellent this year. Brazilian cinema was in absolutely every single festival, from Sundance, which is the first one, to Marrakesh, which is the last one of the year.

14:55And how great is that? Very few years were like this one, and it shows a capacity to recover, but also our, I would say, the talent to tell stories that somehow reflect this very specific culture that Fernanda talked about. Viva, thank you so much.

15:36Thank you so much, Fernando Torres and Walter Salles there, from I'm Still Here, which is out now in Brazil, US, Europe, and will be released in the UK from the 21st of February with selected previews from the 8th. The show was edited by Alan Whedon and thank you very much for listening.