Director Walter Salles‘ new film “I’m Still Here” is a powerful historical drama about the oppressive military dictatorship in his native Brazil during the 1970s, as told through the eyes of Eunice Paiva (Fernanda Torres), the wife of a civil engineer and politician (Selton Mello) murdered by the regime. It’s also a deeply personal memory film for Salles, who knew the Paiva family and spent time in their home during the happy years before Rubens Paiva was kidnapped, tortured, and killed.
For lead actor Fernanda Torres, there was something mystical about playing a character not only taken from real life but from Salles’ memories. “One thing that struck me when I watched this movie for the first time was the honesty,” Torres told a sold-out crowd at the American Cinematheque following a screening of “I’m Still Here.”
“We didn’t look like we were acting. It was like it was really something from Walter’s memory. I think he orchestrated that.”
Selton Mello, who played Torres’ husband, joined her, Salles, and screenwriter Heitor Lorega at the post-screening discussion and agreed that the circumstances Salles created on set led to some unique effects. “We shot chronologically, which is very rare,” he said. “The day I left the house, I left the film. When I turned around to Fernanda for the last time, I had to give her a smile that [her character] would remember for the rest of her life.”
That, Mello said, was tricky because he had to be conveying a significance of which his character was completely unaware. “It was very hard to play that scene because I knew what was going on but he didn’t,” he said. “I had to be very relaxed like, I’m going to be back today, or maybe tomorrow. Like everything is going to be fine.” Mello said it helped that he was playing the scene with child actors who played his kids and helped him get back to the purity of his profession. “Every time I work with kids it’s great because they remind me of the freshness of just being there, of not acting.”
Torres shared Mello’s impulse to avoid acting in the conventional sense as much as possible, realizing that a key to her character was her restraint — and that somehow, being as subtle as possible would allow Eunice to come alive as she existed in Salles’ mind.
“There was this process of not showing the emotion but of hiding it and holding it and restraining it,” Torres said. “I was in awe of the strength that restraining emotions can create, because then I think the audience becomes a witness to this woman who cannot express herself.”
According to Torres, Eunice’s emotions become projected onto the audience, and vice versa, in a profound way. “The audience is who screams and reacts,” she said. “It’s a kind of acting that’s closer to being.”
In some cases, Torres said Salles even grabbed reaction shots that weren’t part of the scene on the fly to get even more natural moments, as when a young actor playing one of the kids reacted sadly to the fact that Mello was not just leaving the film as a character, but as an actor and friend. “She was experiencing a kind of sadness, and Walter stole a shot of her.”
Torres feels that the film’s significance as a memory piece goes beyond what Salles remembers about the Paivas and becomes its own statement against a country losing its cultural memory. “Eunice was losing her memory to Alzheimer’s at the same time as the country was losing its memory of what happened during the dictatorship,” she said. “The history of this woman is so related to the history of Brazil. She had to reinvent herself, just like the country.”
For Torres, the amazing thing about Eunice Paiva is that she never cared to be recognized or celebrated, but through the power of cinema, she can now be properly celebrated. “This was a process of doing something that Eunice would be proud of,” Torres said. “Now Eunice is more alive than ever, and the film, in a way, is the body of Rubens Paiva that was never returned. It’s the proof that they existed. When I think about this film, it’s so amazing what art can do — it’s a weapon against oblivion.”
“I’m Still Here” is Brazil’s submission for the 2025 Best International Feature Oscar. It will have an awards-qualifying run in December before opening in more theaters nationwide January 17, 2025.
