The Act

Big on mood but light on any sort of secure narrative footing, the latest short film from Brazilian actress and director Bárbara Paz is highly experimental in form. The film, as you might expect from a director who knows a thing or two about performance, benefits hugely from Alessandra Maestrini in the central role of Eva, as she brings both her emotional and impressive vocal range to the part.

Through the course of a film, she will meet the much older Dante (Eduardo Moreira), a man who it seems is longing for death. The story is both impenetrable and, in some ways, unimportant, since it seems Paz is more intent on using it as a springboard for Maestrini to run the gamut of emotions. Shot largely in a sort of shadowy close up that frequently turns the performers into little more than silhouettes, we see Eva move from tears to laughter to a piece of Puccini, delicately rendered.

There's something primal at work here that offers compensation for the lack of narrative structure - you'll certainly feel something as you watch it even if the experience doesn't linger.