Everything old is new again, or, as The Who sang in the ironically titled “Won’t Get Fooled Again” — “Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.” In this painful world, the counterculture becomes corporate culture, andthe one-time revolutionbecomes authoritarian rule. The state is overthrown by the opposition party, who then become the thing they hated — the revolutionary Ortega overthrew the dictatorial Somoza, only to become a dictator himself; Choibalsan took over from Amar and sent him to death before becoming infinitely worse; Rákosi and his ‘salami tactics’ supplanted Tildy, only to become… well, you get it.
I’m Still Hereis the best film he’s made in 20 years, and it deserves the acclaim it’s received, especially for its lead performance from Fernanda Torres. While Demi Moore will likely win the Academy Award for Best Actress forThe Substance, thoughMikey Madison is absolutely deserving of a win forAnora, it’s Torres who honestly gives the most powerful performance of the Oscar-nominated actresses from 2024 thanks to this beautiful film about family, memory, and commitment.
A Family You’d Want to Be a Part Of
I’m Still Here
I’m Still Here is set during the early 1970s military dictatorship in Brazil, focusing on the Paiva family. As the regime intensifies, Rubens, Eunice, and their five children live in an open house by the beach in Rio. Their lives are upended when Rubens is taken for questioning and does not return.
I’m Still Herehas the kind of beginning that makes you want to go fullPleasantvilleand crawl inside the movie screen to live with the illusion forever. The first act of the film is a beautiful example of “show, don’t tell” filmmaking, creating exposition out of organic, everyday interactions. While few families are as happy as the Paivas (circa 1970 in Rio de Janeiro), the performances and direction completely convince us of this family’s contentment.
We watch them on the beach and in their home, dancing to vinyl records, playing backgammon, feeding the pipe dream of a new home, eating and gossiping and laughing and sighing. It’s an almost exhilarating first act, and it effectively ingratiates you with the Paiva family and their friends. You’re emotionally involved, which makes the rest of the film that much more devastating. After all, we’re reminded by the beginning text and the very first imagery (of Torres swimming in the ocean with a military helicopter rushing by above) that this story takes place at the height of the military dictatorship in Brazil, something which wouldn’t ease up until the late ’80s.
Conan O’Brien and the Oscars' Creative Team Tease the 97th Academy Awards
The 97th Academy Awards are just around the corner, airing live on ABC and streaming live on Hulu on Sunday, August 07, 2025, at 7 p.m. ET/4 p.m. PT. Conan O’Brien will be hosting and answered press questions in his comedically elliptical way.
Joining O’Brien at the Oscars press conference were Raj Kapoor (executive producer and showrunner), Katy Mullan (executive producer), Rob Paine (co-executive producer), Mike Sweeney (producer and writer), Jon Macks (writer), Michael Bearden (music director), Alana Billingsley (production designer), and Mandy Moore (supervising choreographer).
Before long, a group of mysterious and intimidating men come knocking at the Paivas' door, and the lovable and huggable patriarch of the family, Rubens (an incredible and warm Selton Mello), is taken away, ostensibly for a deposition. Multiple mysterious men awkwardly remain in their home while Rubens is gone. His wife, Eunice (Fernanda Torres), does what she can — she tries to humanize them and find some sort of compassion, making them food and keeping them comfortable, while trying to keep her children safe. It doesn’t much matter, though, as she and her daughter Eliana (Luiza Kosovski) are the next subjects of a “deposition.” When hoods are placed over their heads, they realize that things are not as clear-cut as they’d hoped.
Learning How to Survive a Dictatorship
The majority ofI’m Still Heredeals with the reality of a woman — who is married to a former Congressional representative who has become one of many targets of the military dictatorship — trying to keep herself and her children alive and even happy despite the world around them. The most fascinating aspect of this is that element of happiness itself. Eunice and her family’s reactions sometimes rely upon a kind of “fake it ‘til you make it” aesthetic, which may be mere artifice in some instances, but becomes a pure type of resilience and even rebellion. When a newspaper photographer organizes the family and asks them not to smile, to look sad, Eunice rebels with a smile and makes her children laugh in response. To her, despair would be a kind of defeat.
Roger Ebert Loved the Most Despised Best Picture Oscar Winner
Just about everyone, including its own director and the Academy itself, believes ‘Crash’ didn’t deserve Best Picture - except Roger Ebert.
That’s just one of the many little ways in which Salles explores the survival techniques of this woman. The most important of all of them is the binding of the family itself, and the ways in which they protect each other. Despite how powerful Eunice is, she couldn’t have survived this period without her children and her friends, who may as well be family. The same could be said for anyone in the film.I’m Still Herehas some jarring time jumps, and each of them reminds us how important the Paiva family connection is as life ebbs and flows.
While the script by Murilo Hauser and Heitor Lorega is surprisingly complicated and sprawling, Salles takes an extremely focused approach in his direction that allows us to concentrate on one thing at a time. Whether that’s a dance in the living room, a torturous interrogation, a drive through a military checkpoint, or a game of foosball, Salles’ direction feels incredibly present and without distraction. We experience things as Eunice does, and without excess cinematic mechanics.
Aside from Adrian Teijido’s restrained but fitting cinematography, Salles' only other explicitly cinematic tool is music by the great Nick Cave bandmate, Warren Ellis. It’s a staggeringly beautiful score, and Salles is supremely wise in how he uses it; there are maybe two moments when it dominates everything, and they are the only two moments in which it should. It’s a perfect complement to the film, which is just about the most you can ask of a score.
Oscar Predictions 2025: Where the Race Stands In the Final Stretch
Things have changed. Here are our current frontrunners.
The Many Endings of ‘I’m Still Here’
That emotional power is slightly depleted by the time the film ends. First comes a subtle yet powerful conclusion to the family’s life in Rio de Janeiro. Then it jumps 25 years into the future and, after a while, manages to achieve an emotional and satisfactory ending to Eunice’s quest for an official recognition of her husband’s fate from the government.
Then it jumps 20 years after that, requiring different casting and becoming ultimately excessive both in terms of narrative and emotional impact. There is, of course, a kind of brilliance in having Torres' mother, the great Fernanda Montenegro of a previous Walter Salles film, portray her as an older woman (though she doesn’t look much like the Eunice we’ve seen throughout the film). At 138 minutes,I’m Still Herecould’ve easily been cut by 15 minutes, or it could’ve used an additional 15 minutes to make its epilogues less jarring and more meaningful. As it stands, the film’s ending lives in a sort of purgatory.
10 Most Shocking Oscar Moments of the Last 25 Years, Ranked
The Oscars aren’t just about glitz and glamour. Since its inception, the ceremony has seen its share of controversy, scandal, and shocking moments.
And yet, to reference the beginning of this article, maybe that’s the point — things don’t just ‘end.’ History repeats itself, not only in the way that daughters become their mothers but in how revolutionaries become the authorities they topple. Brazil may have ended its period of fascistic dictators, but it was pretty close to falling back into that grotesque groove recently, when Bolsonaro and his opposition party tried to overthrow president Lula da Silva and corrupt the presidential election as a result.
Like many other countries, Brazil seems to be just one moment away from totalitarianism. With the U.S. government currently being purged of previous appointees and replaced by Trump loyalists, and U.S. migrants being “disappeared” (and even sent to Guantanamo Bay), Americans may want to start paying attention to these kinds of things, and giveI’m Still Herea good, long watch. Produced by VideoFilmes, RT Features, MACT Productions, Arte France Cinéma, Conspiração, and Globoplay,I’m Still Hereis currently in theaters from Sony Pictures Classics. Findtheaters and showtimes here.
