Grace Passô inspires creativity by exploring the malleability of form. The actor, director and playwright adapted her play into her debut feature film, Our Secret, which premiered in Berlin seven years after her medium-length film, Dazed Flesh, also adapted from a play, premiered at the same festival.
“Our Secret” is set in the Brazilian city of Belo Horizonte and depicts a black family struggling to get back on its feet after losing its patriarch. While the adults bury themselves deep in painful silence, the youngest member of the family realizes a powerful secret that lies within the family. It’s a secret he longs to share with his loved ones. When the truth is finally revealed, this intimate drama melts into a fascinating experiment in genre that explores the complex themes of grief and ancestral memory. Watch the special trailer below.
In an interview with Variety ahead of the film’s world premiere, Passo said her family’s story is one that has “followed her for years.” When the time came to direct her first feature film, she wanted to go back to the first play she had written and continue “following the pattern of my career of revisiting the work I had done on stage on screen.”
“This story combines intimacy with recurring themes throughout my career,” she continues. “It’s an event that takes place in the intimate world of a family, with a mix of realism and surrealism. This film was born out of a long-standing desire to direct a feature film and a partnership with producer Ricardo (Alves Jr.). We worked hard together to find the resources to make it happen, and we were both deeply invested in this film and the story we wanted to tell.”
Regarding the difference between telling this heartbreaking story on stage and on screen, the creator says, “The art form you choose to tell the story says a lot about what you want to say.”
“Songs are different from books and different from plays,” she added. “Experiencing the concept of love through these different formats creates different emotions within me. What I’m interested in is understanding how to engage the audience’s sensibilities through different formats. I’ve always been drawn to the creative side of directing.”
Despite not necessarily being a large-scale ensemble piece and taking place primarily within a family’s home, casting was a long and essential process to bring “Our Secret” to life. Passo, in particular, felt that the film relied heavily on audiences believing in the closeness of the family on screen. The most difficult piece of the puzzle, the director says, was finding a child to play Tutu. The role was ultimately given to newcomer Ephraim Santos.
“Originally, I wrote the role of a girl who was about 7 years old and based the entire audition process on that description,” she says. “At auditions, I’m often surprised by the kids I meet, because most of them are acting for the first time, and what they do is often unexpected. It’s very special to witness kids discovering the idea of a movie for the first time. Ephraim didn’t match the characteristics I originally wanted for the role, but he was so funny that I fell in love with his audition.”
The recent international success of films such as Kleber Mendonça Filho’s The Secret Agent and Silver Bear-winning director Gabriel Mascaro’s Blue Trail reflects a powerful decentralizing moment in Brazilian cinema. Despite Brazil’s northeast having a great filmmaking heritage dating back to the Cinema Novo era, for the past two decades most of Brazil’s major production companies have been based in Rio and São Paulo, and the country’s audiovisual output often reflects this geographic imbalance. “Our Secret” was filmed entirely in Belo Horizonte, the capital of Minas Gerais, Passo’s home state.
“Our Secret”, courtesy of © entrefilms / Wilssa Esser
“The struggle of every culture is to overcome its stereotypes,” the director says, reflecting on this moment. “Obviously, Brazil is seen through some stereotypes abroad, but our country is a continent. Our culture is very diverse. It’s very important that Brazil can be seen in its true size and dimension on screen, not only to be able to portray our country more honestly abroad, but also to further strengthen our domestic industry. Brazil is much bigger than Rio or São Paulo.”
Still on the theme of breaking stereotypes, Passo emphasizes how interested he is in understanding “Our Secret” as part of “a story that introduces new dimensions to the lives of black Brazilians on screen.”
“We are well aware that one of the greatest achievements of international black cinema is how it has overcome certain stereotypes about being black,” she added. “There’s a tradition of black stories being associated with tragedy or seeing black people as mythical omniscient beings who exist to teach the world how to destroy racism. I didn’t want to associate this family with tragedy or teaching. I’m not interested in teaching people who are on a racial literacy journey how not to be racist. And being free to do that is one of the greatest contributions of black cinema in recent years.”
Passo wanted his film to “rescue the memory of black people in general and in me.” In every moment of human grief, there is a moment when we do not know how to express what is happening and what death represents in our lives. Having the family go through it together and wrestle with the silence that remains between them was an attempt to humanize the story, allowing the black characters to be portrayed rather than as teachers leading the audience through stages of grief, or as people directly connected to their suffering and punished. I wanted our experience to be more than one. ”
“Our Secret” is produced by Entrefilmes in collaboration with Desvia, Globo Filmes, Quarta-Feira Filmes, Foi Bonita a Festival and Producões Grãos da Imagem. Open Reel will be responsible for worldwide sales.
