Blood in Bahia’s Hot

The love story of 16-year-olds Vandinha and João. They live in a favela of Salvador de Bahia, famous for its historic centre, exuberant carnival, largely black population but also high crime rates. Sometimes João sells his body or robs someone in the local gay circuit, but he tries to get money without behaving as a desperado. When Vandinha is pregnant with her second child, he suddenly disappears. Vandinha decides to go looking for João and sets off on a journey through the favela.
Italian director Aurelio Grimaldi, who has acquired fame since the 1990s with hot-blooded and occasionally controversial films such as The Whores, Rosa Funzeca and La donna lupo, shot this film with young people without acting experience but in the same situation – coming from the favelas. Not the umpteenth terrible story full of social evils, but a quest for love, largely inspired by events that Grimaldi came across through a friend who ‘adopted’ a boy from the favela.

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