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A mother is forced to reinvent herself when her family’s life is destroyed by an act of arbitrary violence during the tightening grip of Brazil’s military dictatorship in 1971. The Brazilian Film Academy selected it for the Best International Feature Film award at the 2025 Academy Awards. Eunice Paiva: Martha, you have to help. My husband is in danger! Martha: Everyone is in danger, Eunice.. Appears in Mais Você: Episode 3, December 2024 (2024). Festa do Santo Reis Written by Léo Maia (as Marcio Leonardo) Performed by Tim Maia. "I’m Still Here" goes beyond being just a film about the military dictatorship, offering a human, intense and brutally intimate portrait of a family torn apart by overwhelming, uncontrollable forces. With his raw style and unparalleled sensitivity, Walter Salles returns to the theme of a country plunged into oppression, but instead of focusing on major political events, he focuses on their domestic and private consequences. By focusing the story on a family drama, Salles subverts the expectations of traditional historical films, avoiding documentary tones or a broad, structural focus. Here, 1970s Brazil is felt through the struggles of the Paiva family, and in the painful detail of their shared wounds, Salles shows the scars left by the dictatorship, which, although distorted in the collective memory, remain alive in the lives destroyed. The focus of the narrative through the perspective of Eunice – played by the iconic Fernanda Torres and Fernanda Montenegro – gives the film an undeniable authenticity. Coping with the loss of her husband, Rubens Paiva (Selton Mello), a public figure and human rights activist, Eunice must hold the family together and maintain the emotional stability of her children. Eunice is the pure embodiment of resilience and maternal love, her daily routines, rituals with her children and moments spent as a family are part of a once ordinary life that is now shattered by his sudden absence. Memories of family dinners and trips to the beach become painful when Rubens’ disappearance occurs, as they reveal the empty space left by systematic violence. Salles skillfully uses this family intimacy to show how dictatorship destroys emotional bonds and disrupts peace in every home, and encourages the audience to reflect on how loss and even the quiet moments of everyday life shape history. Fernanda Torres’ The performance is commendable. She embodies a woman who does not let her grief immobilize her, balancing between protecting her children and the relentless search for answers about her husband’s whereabouts. That balance of strength and vulnerability gives Eunice a striking and essential presence in the film. In a poignant and remarkably mature performance, Montenegro, as the older Eunice, reinforces Rubens’ absence, bringing a heavy, almost physical silence that resonates with those who never had the chance to say goodbye. Montenegro and Torres’ real-life relationship as mother and daughter lends credibility to the transitions of time, making Eunice’s portrayal all the more honest and compelling. This genuine continuity allows Salles’ film to transcend mere fiction and reach a depth that only a personal story can achieve. Technically, the film is a visual achievement that captures the intimate pain of the family through meticulously crafted cinematography. The limited use of space and close-ups reveal the characters’ physical and psychological confinement, reflecting the oppression they face in their lives. The soundtrack accompanies the most emotional scenes with an almost mystical quality, blending with the characters’ feelings like a whisper that preserves the pain of the past. Salles’ use of music is not only interesting for heightening the drama, but also evokes an almost palpable nostalgia in the air, an echo of loss that can never be overcome.