Esmir Filho

Esmir Filho’s journey in film started back in 2004 after wrapping up his studies at FAAP film school, São Paulo. The guy didn’t waste time—his very first feature, “Os Famosos e os Duendes da Morte” (The Famous and the Dead), not only snagged a distributor like Warner Bros in Brazil but went on to clean up at festivals. It won the Rio Festival in 2009, got picked for Berlinale Generation 14+, and landed in Locarno’s official competition. We’re talking best film, best direction, critics’ awards at Havana, Valdivia, Granada, Guadalajara… the list’s kind of wild. The film didn’t just stop at Brazil either; it hit theaters in France, Japan, Portugal—basically, it went global. Before that, his short “Alguma Coisa Assim” (Something Like That) grabbed best screenplay at Cannes in 2006, which is no small feat. Then there’s “Saliva,” a short that actually got chosen to represent Brazil in the Oscar race for 2008. By 2011, Esmir was running his own production company, Saliva Shots, pulling together fresh content for cinema, TV, and the internet. He’s not afraid to blend things up either—his multimedia piece “Kollwitzstrasse 52” meshed cinema and theater and was featured at São Paulo’s Museum of Image and Sound. Right now, he’s prepping his next feature, “Baleia (Whale),” and working on the script for “Madeira de Lei” (Hardwood), a thriller set in the Amazon. Seriously, the guy’s resume is stacked.