Carnaval(1990)

City of God(pt)

In the poverty-stricken favelas of Rio de Janeiro in the 1970s, two young men choose different paths. Rocket is a budding photographer who documents the increasing drug-related violence of his neighborhood, while José “Zé” Pequeno is an ambitious drug dealer diving into a dangerous life of crime.

Central Station(pt)

An emotional journey of a former school teacher, who writes letters for illiterate people, and a young boy, whose mother has just died, as they search for the father he never knew.

Streets of Glória(pt)

Gabriel, a 24-year-old anthropologist from a wealthy family from the interior of the Northeast, is gay and in the closet. Following the death of his grandmother, he decides to go to Rio de Janeiro to study the lives of sex workers. Seduced by his object of study, Gabriel will become one of them.

Freaks(en)

A circus' beautiful trapeze artist agrees to marry the leader of side-show performers, but his deformed friends discover she is only marrying him for his inheritance.

Nightmare Alley(en)

An ambitious carnival man with a talent for manipulating people with a few well-chosen words hooks up with a female psychologist who is even more dangerous than he is.

Lili(en)

Members of a circus troupe "adopt" Lili Daurier when she finds herself stranded in a strange town. The magician who first comes to her rescue already has romantic entanglements and thinks of her as a little girl. Who can she turn to but the puppets, singing to them her troubles, forgetting that there are puppeteers? A crowd gathers around Lili as she sings. The circus has a new act. She now has a job. Will she get her heart's desire?

Fox and His Friends(de)

Fox, a former circus performer, wins the lottery of DM 500,000 and can now have the life and things that he has always wanted. While he wants to climb up the social ladder, it isn't without turmoil, and being torn between his old working class roots, and the shiny new facade of middle class consciousness.

Paper Moon(en)

A bible salesman finds himself saddled with a young girl who may or may not be his daughter, and the two forge an unlikely partnership as a money-making con team in Depression-era Kansas.

An American Crime(en)

The true story of suburban housewife Gertrude Baniszewski, who kept a teenage girl locked in the basement of her Indiana home during the 1960s.

Nightmare Alley(en)

Roustabout Stanton Carlisle joins a traveling carny and unsuccessfully schemes to figure out the mind-reading act of Mademoiselle Zeena and her alcoholic husband, Pete.

The Rum Diary(en)

Tired of the noise and madness of New York and the crushing conventions of late Eisenhower-era America, itinerant journalist Paul Kemp travels to the pristine island of Puerto Rico to write for a local San Juan newspaper run by the downtrodden editor Lotterman. Adopting the rum-soaked lifestyle of the late ‘50s version of Hemingway’s 'The Lost Generation', Paul soon becomes entangled with a very attractive American woman and her fiancée, a businessman involved in shady property development deals.  It is within this world that Kemp ultimately discovers his true voice as a writer and integrity as a man.

Cart Pushers(en)

Raymond, a maladjusted cart pusher at a dying grocery store, has a brief yet confusing romance with an underage cashier during the final months of a suburban New Jersey summer.

Kehraus(de)

Ferdinand Weitel, a forklift driver, is desperate: Insurance agent Arno von Mehling, a true sales talent, has had contracts signed in record amounts. Now Weitel is wandering through the corridors of the insurance company trying to save what can still be saved - on Shrove Tuesday of all days. The department for customer service and complaints is in a colorful mood and has no ear for Weitel's worries. Finally, secretary Annerose Waguscheit takes heart and tells him about the evening carnival ball "Traum-Police", where he can safely find Mr. Mehling.

Nos Embalos de Ipanema(pt)

Toquinho is a young man living in Marechal Hermes, a poor neighborhood in Rio de Janeiro, together with his widow mother and a younger sister. Although he is poor, he is also ambitious, and wants to change his life. He spends all his time on the beach, at Arpoador, Ipanema, where he dreams to become a famous surfer. Besides, he usually finds Patricia there, a rich and liberated young woman, whom he likes a lot. To impress Patricia and satisfy some of her wishes, he lets himself be seduced by André, a gay guy who, in return for his sexual favors, promises him a trip to Hawaii for a surf championship.

Casanova(en)

With a reputation for seducing members of the opposite sex, regardless of their marital status, a notorious womanizer discovers a beauty who seems impervious to his charms. However, as he continues to pursue the indifferent lady, he finds himself falling in love.

The Pleasure(it)

Edgard has just lost his wife Eleonore he had met at the carnival in Venice. It evokes his memory by listening to tapes . His brother's wife Ursula and his son Edmond come to move in with him. If the teen tries to seduce his aunt, Ursula wants to replace Eleonore in the heart of Edgard . He refuses until the day Ursula sold at auction to local brothel ...

Carny(en)

Tired of being a small-town waitress, Donna departs with the latest carnival show, living with entertainers Frankie and Patch in a tense, emotional triangle.

Black Orpheus(pt)

Young lovers Orfeu and Eurydice run through the favelas of Rio during Carnaval, on the lam from a hitman dressed like Death and Orfeu's vengeful fiancée Mira and passing between moments of fantasy and stark reality. This impressionistic retelling of the Greek legend of Orpheus and Eurydice introduced bossa nova to the world with its soundtrack by young Brazilian composers Luiz Bonfá and Antonio Carlos Jobim.

O Mercador do Efêmero(pt)

Wild Orchid(en)

A woman lawyer becomes mesmerized by a self-made millionaire during an encounter in Rio setting off a series of erotic encounters.