I want to make movies that challenge your understanding of the world.
Writing the first one right now.
Since I was a kid, I always wanted to change the world, creating a healthier, more prosperous society with more freedom for all. But then I realized we can't change the world without first changing hearts and minds. To go beyond, first we need to go within.
And that's why I make movies.
If I can explore some of the biggest issues surrounding human behaviour, issues that have been covertly plaguing our civilization for millennia, but doing so very subtly, underneath a rich cinematic experience, filled with ideas and feelings you've never thought about or felt before, I will be successful.
A mixed-race kid of the 90s, and of a deeply impoverished drug-addicted hippie & punk hawker couple, who was left by one at age 3, who started life with no electricity and no cooking gas where mom cooked with alcohol in a tin can and the pan held by two bricks, had to sleep on the streets and lived in a 1-dollar-a-day brothel at age 10, who traveled half the Brazilian coast by age 12, a descendant of Indigenous Brazilians and Spanish slaves, who survived 15 years of domestic violence, 7+ years of health issues, medical negligence and abandonment, and 3 years of bullying, was class-discriminated, police-abused, who bought his first computer working as a henna tattoo artist under the scorching Sun on the beaches of Ilhabela at age 14 and, without a camera, began learning photography via an online photography simulator and acquired a world-class command of the English language using Google Translate on dial-up internet. If you looked at my picture and intro and thought "privileged white male", my first challenge to your understanding of the world is complete.
You're welcome — that projection couldn't be farther from the truth.
Along that messy road, I managed to sneak in a few nice, positive things, though:
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1997 • Learned to surf at age 4 by watching surfers from shore and borrowing their surf boards, which led to being featured on the cover of a surf magazine;
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1998-2000 • Almost got a Yellow Belt in both Capoeira & Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu at ages 5 and 7, respectively. The reasons why "almost" are mildly interesting;
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2005 • #1 student in a school-wide select top-students competition in 4th grade;
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2006 • #3 math student in the whole school in 5th grade (below only two high school students);
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2007 • Became the 2nd best beginner Optimist sailor in the State of São Paulo at age 14, scoring a few trophies and medals, and qualifying for the national championship (which I, unfortunately, could not participate because my mom couldn't pay for the trip), thanks to a public sailing school in Ilhabela. Not going to the national championship was very hurtful as sailing was really important to me;
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2006-2012 • Acted in over 12 plays, in 5 cities, 3 ballet dances, and got nominated for Best Supporting Actor in 2011's Mapa Cultural Paulista (State-wide competition);
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2011-now • Became a guitarist and songwriter in my spare time, first learning using a cheap acoustic guitar another hawker let me borrow for a month, then with a cheap electric guitar my mom gave me as a present at age 18, that I played by plugging into my computer using a P10 to P2 adapter, using free guitar amp simulators through my computer speakers, and learning songs via tablatures. I have not produced or released any of my songs yet;
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2019 • Top 15 on the global leader board of the Harvard CS50's Speller Challenge.
There's more to my story, it is quite unusual and more painful than you can imagine, a story of endurance and beating the odds, but, at my core, I have always been and will always be an ever-curious learner of cinema, communication, human behaviour & the world; a natural storyteller, musician and problem-solver; a collaborator at heart; and a lover of the sea. Ultimately, a realist, with a healthy dose of optimism, who never gives up.