I'm Still Here

"I'm Still Here" (Ainda Estou Aqui) chronicles the true story of the Paiva family, whose idyllic life in 1970s Rio de Janeiro is shattered by the Brazilian military dictatorship. The film opens with warm, sunlit scenes of former congressman Rubens Paiva (Selton Mello), his wife Eunice (Fernanda Torres), and their five children enjoying a vibrant life by Leblon Beach. This peace is abruptly destroyed when agents of the regime abduct Rubens from their home, claiming he is being taken for a simple deposition. He is never seen again.

The narrative then shifts to focus entirely on Eunice's perspective. After being detained and psychologically tortured herself, she is released into a world of uncertainty and fear. Forced to raise her children alone and with no official confirmation of her husband's fate, Eunice transforms from a homemaker into a tenacious activist. The film follows her decades-long, courageous fight for justice and truth, not only for her husband but for all the "disappeared" victims of the dictatorship, even as her own memory begins to fade in her later years due to Alzheimer's disease.

At its core, "I'm Still Here" is a profound exploration of memory, resilience, and resistance in the face of state-sponsored terror. Director Walter Salles sought to tell a story about the reconstruction of a family's memory and, by extension, a country's memory. The film is a powerful indictment of authoritarianism, not through explicit depictions of violence, but by focusing on the devastating emotional void and psychological torture inflicted upon a family torn apart. It highlights the transformation of personal grief into political action, showing how one woman's refusal to forget becomes an act of defiance against a regime that seeks to erase its crimes. The movie serves as a poignant reminder that the fight for democracy and human rights is a continuous struggle, making a timely statement against the rise of far-right ideologies and the denial of historical atrocities.

While the film's narrative is a direct, fact-based account, different interpretations arise from its focus and ending. One perspective is that the film is less a political thriller and more a psychological study of grief and the ambiguous nature of loss when there is no closure. The focus is not on the investigation into Rubens's murder but on the emotional toll of "not knowing" and the family's struggle to function within a void.

Another interpretation centers on the final scenes featuring Eunice with Alzheimer's. Some viewers see this as a deeply tragic irony: a woman who dedicated her life to fighting against forgetting ultimately loses her own memory. A more optimistic reading, however, suggests that even as her personal memory fades, the collective memory she helped build—the historical truth of the regime's crimes—endures. Her fight was successful precisely because the story can now be told and remembered by others, even when she no longer can. This frames her personal tragedy not as a defeat, but as a testament to her legacy's strength.

"I'm Still Here" has had a profound cultural and political impact in Brazil and internationally. Arriving at a time of heightened political polarization in Brazil, the film reignited a national conversation about the country's military dictatorship (1964-1985) and the importance of preserving historical memory, particularly in the face of denialism from far-right movements. The film's success was seen as a form of cultural resistance; audiences in Brazil reportedly applauded, cried, and shouted “Dictatorship never again” during screenings.

Its historic Oscar win for Best International Feature Film and Best Picture nomination marked a major milestone for Brazilian cinema, bringing unprecedented global attention to the nation's film industry and its history. The film's acclaim, including Fernanda Torres's Golden Globe win, was celebrated as a moment of national pride. It not only achieved massive box office success in Brazil, becoming the highest-grossing domestic film since the pandemic, but it also challenged and overcame an attempted boycott by political extremists, demonstrating its resonance with a wide audience. By telling a deeply personal story, the film made the abstract horror of a political regime visceral and universally relatable, serving as a powerful tribute to the countless families affected by state violence in Brazil and beyond.

Audience reception in Brazil was overwhelmingly positive and deeply emotional. The film became a cultural phenomenon, grossing over $36 million and becoming the most-watched Brazilian film since the COVID-19 pandemic. Viewers reported that screenings were often followed by applause and emotional outpourings, with many expressing that the film served as a necessary and visceral confrontation with a dark chapter of the nation's history. It resonated across generations, bringing together younger viewers and older ones who had lived through the dictatorship. While there was an attempted boycott by far-right groups who dispute the historical facts of the dictatorship, it was largely unsuccessful, highlighting the film's powerful connection with the majority of the Brazilian public. Internationally, audiences and critics praised the film for its powerful, understated emotion and its universal themes of resilience and justice.