Director: Mariana Bastos
Year: 2023
Country: Brazil
Alternate Titles: N/A
Genre: Supernatural
Plot:
After arriving in a small town, a teen finds herself distanced from her father by joining a group of friends who undergo a strict religious practice in a local church, but the more she hands around them the more she comes to find their religious teachings conflicting with her personal beliefs.
Review:
This was a highly enjoyable and effective genre outing. One of the better aspects at play here is the generally impressive setup that's designed to showcase a fantastic religious context for the whole affair. Given a brief bit about the family as they arrive in the town and how he feels about it compared to her more open-minded experience that brings her into the group of advocates for the church, there's a fine connection here that becomes tied even closer once they realize what her actual beliefs really are later on in the film. Having spent a lot of time around them and getting to see their crazed beliefs involving the extreme prejudice women receive in religious texts that her desire to correct spurs the trauma inflicted upon her in the second half.
While that provides a great setup for what's going on, the main subplot finally becomes revealed here with the overwhelming religious oppression at the heart of the film. As the initial outbursts and pushbacks against her from the community come from her misguided if unintentional remarks about how their church has so much oppression towards women, it starts to turn the townspeople against her to the degree that she's labeled a witch and heretic worth shunning and fighting back against. This is showcased in the finale where her turning the tables back on them after everything they've done to her speaks heavily to the type of religious persecution and hysteria at the heart of the film with the backlash she faces once they learn her plans. That section becomes a bit heavy-handed with the allegories featured here but it's not as bad as expected as that's the only issue with this one.
Overview: ****/5
An overall fun if somewhat confrontational genre effort, there's more than enough to like here that manages to hold it up as the few flaws aren't really that big to bring it down. Those who appreciate this type of genre effort or are intrigued by this type of setup will like it the most while others who aren't into these factors should heed caution with this one.
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