'Funk' Brings Rio's Funk Parties to the Screen, Director Aly Muritiba Says

Brazilian musical Funk, directed by Aly Muritiba, has premiered at the Tribeca Festival in New York and played in competition at the Huelva Ibero-American Film Festival in Spain, according to Variety.

The film follows Sabrina, played by Duda Santos, a young woman who dreams of becoming a star of Brazilian funk. Funk is a style of dance music that grew out of Rio de Janeiro's favelas, the hillside neighbourhoods where many working-class and Black Brazilians live. Muritiba said the idea to "speak about favela from a different perspective" came from producers Heitor Dhalia and Manoel Rangel. Both had shot television series in Rio's favelas and had seen what he called the "potency of funk" up close.

To prepare, Muritiba spent time at funk parties across Rio while he worked on the script and the look of the film. The casting was handled by Alonso Zerbinato, who searched the favelas and the parties for performers. The ensemble includes real-life funk singers Lellê and MC Nem, and most of the cast are working funk performers, according to Variety.

Santos is best known to Brazilian television audiences. She starred in the telenovelas Garota do Momento and A Nobreza do Amor in the last two years. For Funk, Variety reports that she spent hours each day training in singing, dancing, stage presence and extended rehearsals.

Muritiba also spoke about the film's frank approach to sex and desire. "In the context of the favela, to talk about sex or have sex is to celebrate life and freedom," he said. He linked that to a wider point about who gets to be shown enjoying life on screen. He said that portraying Black bodies living, having fun and taking pleasure is significant in Brazil, a country with more than 300 years of slavery, where large numbers of Black people are killed every day.

Those remarks sit at the centre of the film's pitch. The story is set in communities that are often shown on screen only through crime or hardship, and Muritiba said the music and the parties are where the characters find joy and pride. Funk parties, in his telling, are not a backdrop but the heart of the story.

Festival premieres like Tribeca and Huelva give a film its first public audiences and show buyers where it might travel next. No dates for a wider release have been announced.