Brazilian director Gabriel Mascaro and producer Paula Cosenza have launched Trema, a new production company headquartered in Recife, in the country's Northeast, with a slate of nine film and television projects already in motion. Variety reported the launch on 7 August 2026.

Mascaro is the director of The Blue Trail (O Último Azul), which won the Grand Jury Prize at the 2025 Berlinale — one of the world's three major film festivals, alongside Cannes and Venice. The film also took home two Brazilian Academy Film Awards (Prêmio Grande Otelo): Best Actress for Denise Weinberg and Best Supporting Actor for Rodrigo Santoro. Mascaro was born and raised in Recife, the capital of Pernambuco state, and has lived there his entire life.

Cosenza brings her own international credentials. Her producing credits include Memory House, which screened at Cannes; Tropicalia, seen at Telluride; and Absence, shown at Berlin — all made with international partners. The company's website, trema.art, describes Trema as a Brazilian independent company that develops, finances and produces audiovisual works, and notes that its founders share over two decades of experience.

The launch slate stretches across borders and formats. Three Dark Nights, directed by Theo Court, is a co-production between Spain's El Viaje, Chile's Quijote, Mexico's Varios Lobos and Trema. Rafael, by Brazilian director João Paulo Miranda Maria, is produced with France's Les Valseurs. Arca, by Chile's Matías Bize, holds a distinction: it is the first film financed by Trema's own fund, which mixes public and private investors. That film's producer, Patricio Pereira, previously produced Andrés Wood's Sundance winner Violeta Went to Heaven, with Cosenza as partner.

The slate also includes Paula & Hortencia by Brazil's Joca Georgia Guerra-Peixe, produced with Café Royal and Belladona; Oásis, a limited series directed by Gabriela Amaral Almeida and Armando Praça, co-produced with Recife's Carnaval Filmes and Desvia and Portugal's Coral Europa; 100 Days by Carlos Saldanha, produced with Ventre, Boipeba, O2 Filmes, Total Post, Good Hand and Disney's BVI; and A Grande Castração by Andre Antonio and Rodrigo Almeida, backed by Surto e Deslumbramento, Zebra, Desvia and Trema.

Mascaro is already developing his next film at Trema and exploring the possibility of adapting a Brazilian literary work, though no title has been named. Cosenza is set to attend the Locarno Film Festival, which runs in August, to present Trema's titles and seek new projects — the kind of market round that determines what reaches screens two or three years on.

Trema also has a local mission: to enrol Recife's established craft talent on its projects and bring forward the next generation of film-makers in Brazil's Northeast, a region long underrepresented in a national industry concentrated in São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro.

What stands out is the geographic bet. Most production companies chasing international co-productions plant themselves in São Paulo or Rio. Mascaro and Cosenza have chosen to build from Recife, the city where both have deep roots, and to make that address part of the company's identity rather than a footnote.