The AIDS epidemic was a global health crisis, and a number of recent projects have turned back the clock to put the focus on the lives lost to the disease from around the world.
One such feature is the the film Os Primeiros Soldados (“The First Fallen”) from director Rodrigo de Oliveira, a stirring Brazilian period piece that follows the rapid spread of the epidemic in the coastal city of Vitoría through the intersecting lives of some of the first infected.
It’s 1983, and biology student Suzano (Johnny Massaro) has returned home, sensing a gradual decline in his physical health. He is Vitoría’s first known victim of AIDS, and, due to the lack of information and resources, he feels he has nowhere to turn, choosing to protect his sister Maura and nephew Muriel (Alex Bonin) from the truth.
Related: And the films played on: 17 essential movies about HIV/AIDS
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Thankfully, he finds a sense of community in trans performer Rose (Renata Carvalho) and film student Humberto (Victor Camilo), who are also both living with the disease. Over the course of the year, all three cope in different ways, but provide one another with support and hope in the face of grief.
Filmmaker de Oliveira did extensive research on reports on the epidemic from that era, and used them to inform his story of resilience, one he sees as a celebration of the people “who insisted on dreaming, on loving, on seeking a way out, however precarious it might be.”
With a diverse cast of LGBTQ characters, the feature is also an ode to Brazilian’s vibrant queer community, one that takes stock of a tumultuous past to provide hope for the future.
After making the rounds at international film festivals, Os Primeiros Soldados opens in Brazilian theaters this week. Last year, it was announced that the Miami-based FiGa Films had picked up the film for distribution, but further release or streaming plans have yet to be shared.
In the meantime, you can watch two different trailers for the film below. The first, from its festival run, features English subtitles, while the second, more recent trailer is in Portuguese, but provides a much more in-depth look at Os Primeiros Soldados.
Kangol2
This looks really interesting. I hope it makes its way to US festivals and streaming channels very soon.
tallskin4
“Thankfully, he finds a sense of community in trans performer Rose”
You mean gay drag performer. I know trans invented electricity, sunshine, bubblegum and the petrol engine, but back in the 80s trans activists had not yet captured all the gay and lesbians media and political organisations and all our venues and weren’t pushing a relentless barrage of pro gender woo trans bvllshlt – so a drag act was just that, a drag act!
jcool
are you filling in for mario? is he on vacation?
Kangol2
Have you seen the movie? Did you write it? There were trans performers in the 1980s, there were trans activists in the 1980s, and there were trans people who seroconverted and died of HIV/AIDS in the 1980s. You really do seem obsessed with trans anything!