Santo forte

Including an open-air mass given by the Pope on the Flamengo Park and, months later, Christmas celebrations, this documentary penetrates the intimate lives of Catholics, umbanda believers and evangelicals from a Rio slum (favela). In their individual ways, they believe in direct communication with the supernatural through the intervention of saints, orixás, spiritual guides. Director and journalist Eduardo Coutinho wrote in the newspaper O estado de Sao Paolo: ‘The film is about a team of film-makers who go to the favela and ask questions about people’s religious beliefs. There’s a clear relation of negotiation and conflict between both sides of the camera. Religion is also negotiation. The religious movement in Brazil is just fascinating. The people come and go between different cults during their lives, depending on what they need in terms of health, love and sex.’