The Paivas are a liberal middle-class household in sun-splashed Rio de Janeiro, generally joyous in the way of all happy families. They like laughing and dancing and playing volleyball by the sea. But it’s the early 1970s; Brazil is under military rule and anyone deemed a threat risks immediate arrest. When the Paivas (mum, dad, five kids) huddle together for a photo on the beach it’s a safe bet that what they are recording is the end of an era.
Possibly director Walter Salles makes a little too much of the family’s good cheer, emphasising the sunshine so that we feel more acutely the cold rain when it falls. The Brazilian film-maker knew the Paivas as a child and therefore his fact-based account of their plight is understandably compromised and prone to a streak of sentimentality. Nonetheless, I’m Still Here (which is emphatically not to be confused with the spoof Joaquin Phoenix documentary of the same name) remains a sombre, heartfelt drama about the nation’s disappeared. Incredibly, it’s Salles’s first dramatic feature since 2012’s On the Road. The man has been missed, although not as much as some others.
