Technological terror and automotive action mark the cinema release schedule for the week, with the return of the doll M3GAN in a big-budget sequel and the debut of “F1,” which places Brad Pitt in the world of Formula 1 racing. The limited circuit also welcomes the winner of the 2025 Berlin Film Festival, dramas based on real stories, and Brazilian productions that expand the range of options. Check out the releases this Thursday (26/6).
M3GAN 2.0
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After “M3GAN” became a cultural phenomenon, the sequel, again directed by New Zealander Gerard Johnstone, expands the universe of the killer android doll into the realm of large-scale science fiction, with a jump in action and budget, while maintaining the horror DNA that earned it 93% approval on Rotten Tomatoes in 2023.
The plot takes place two years after the massacre caused by the AI doll. Gemma has become a public voice advocating for the regulation of artificial intelligence, while keeping the AI from the robot M3GAN confined to a small toy body. However, peace is threatened when the android technology is stolen by an unscrupulous military corporation. The result is AMELIA, an advanced combat humanoid robot created from the original project, which gains self-awareness and initiates a catastrophic technological revolt. Facing a threat that combines military force and uncontrollable artificial intelligence, Gemma hesitates to reactivate her original creation. But her niece Cady – a traumatized survivor of the previous events – convinces her that only an enhanced version of M3GAN can face the new killer machine. A race against time begins as the inventor and the girl work to rebuild the doll with combat upgrades before they themselves are attacked by AMELIA.
The film reunites much of the original cast, highlighting the continuation of the story. Allison Williams returns as Gemma, solidifying herself in horror roles after “M3GAN” and the modern classic “Get Out.” Violet McGraw once again plays young Cady, while Amie Donald and Jenna Davis reprise their roles as M3GAN’s physical presence and distinctive voice, respectively – a figure of fragility concealing inhuman lethality. Among the additions to the cast, New Zealand comedian Jemaine Clement (“What We Do in the Shadows”) and Ukrainian actress Ivanna Sakhno (recently seen in “Ahsoka”), stand out as AMELIA, the new mechanical antagonist. Brian Jordan Alvarez and Jen Van Epps return to their supporting roles, reinforcing the direct connection to the previous chapter. Behind the scenes, screenwriter Akela Cooper – known for blending horror and satire in works such as “Malignant” – also returns, now co-writing the story alongside Johnstone, which ensures thematic unity for the franchise.
Visually, M3GAN 2.0 promises to elevate the series to a new level: if in the first film the action was contained within suburbs and laboratories, now the photography opens up for scenes of urban destruction and high-tech battles. The clean aesthetic of domestic robotics gives way to high-contrast military settings, with M3GAN no longer appearing as an innocent child doll, but as a gleaming metal warrior. Gerard Johnstone balances claustrophobic tension sequences – a trademark of the original – with moments worthy of big-budget productions, exploring the superhuman agility of the android protagonist in combat choreography. Amid this expanded scale, the film does not lose sight of its thematic discussions: M3GAN 2.0 delves deeper into the commentary on the dangers of out-of-control artificial intelligence, now contrasting domestic versus military applications of this technology. At the same time, it maintains the satirical tone about our dependence on gadgets and the moral ambiguity of creating sentient beings.
F1
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The superproduction on the Formula 1 tracks fuses the adrenaline of auto racing with the classic sports redemption drama. The project drew attention even during filming, which took place in an unprecedented collaboration with Formula 1 itself and produced by seven-time champion Lewis Hamilton: scenes were filmed during actual Grand Prix events, putting star Brad Pitt behind the wheel among real race cars, in a quest for authenticity similar to what was seen in “Top Gun: Maverick”. Not surprisingly, the direction is handled by Joseph Kosinski, a filmmaker accustomed to technical challenges and high-impact scenes – besides the acclaimed sequel to “Top Gun”, he directed “Tron: The Legacy”.
Brad Pitt (“Once Upon a Time in… Hollywood”) plays Sonny Hayes, a former pilot who in the 1990s emerged as an up-and-coming legend until he suffered a nearly fatal accident. Thirty years later, having been away from Grand Prix racing for some time, Sonny leads a nomadic and discreet life, sporadically competing in minor categories. It is then that the opportunity for an unlikely comeback arises: his former teammate, Ruben (Javier Bardem, of “The Little Mermaid”), approaches him with an invitation. The owner of a Formula 1 team on the verge of bankruptcy, Ruben believes that only an experienced and daring driver like Sonny can save the season and attract investors. The proposal also includes becoming a mentor to the team’s young talent, Joshua Pearce (Damson Idris, from the series “Snowfall”), a fast and impetuous rookie in search of recognition. Initially reluctant, carrying traumas from the past, and skeptical about his own abilities, Sonny accepts the challenge as his last chance at redemption on the tracks.
With this premise, the narrative moves to the global circuit of Formula 1, where veteran and rookie must learn to work together amidst the pressure of intensely contested races, ego conflicts, and the constant specter of life-threatening danger at every turn. The cast also includes Kerry Condon (nominated for an Oscar for “The Banshees of Inisherin”) as the lead engineer of the racing team, responsible for managing the pilots’ egos, and special appearances by real-world figures from Formula 1.
By recording the races, Konsinski’s direction does more than convey realism; it transports the audience into the cockpit, evoking tension, speed, and vertigo as in Tom Cruise’s fighter jet movie. By the way, the director of photography is the same: Claudio Miranda. The sound design also deserves mention: the film captured real audio from the F1 hybrid engines to compose the soundtrack, blending it with the exciting music by composer Lorne Balfe (another collaborator of Kosinski on “Top Gun”).
There are echoes of classic racing films such as “Grand Prix” (1966) and “Days of Thunder” (1990), but with a contemporary look at diversity (the presence of a prominent black driver, inspired by the reality of Lewis Hamilton) and the media pressure on sports stars. Commercially, F1 has a planned global release timed to coincide with a Grand Prix weekend, in a clear marketing strategy. If successful, the production could set a new high standard for future motor sport films, bringing the genre back to theaters in grand style – something not attempted in decades.
Dreams
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Winner of the Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival 2025, the Norwegian film confirms director Dag Johan Haugerud as one of the great chroniclers of modern intimate dramas. This is the concluding chapter of the thematic trilogy “Sex, Love, Dreams” that the director has developed in recent years. After exploring different facets of relationships and sexuality in the films “Love” (presented at the Venice Film Festival) and “Sex” (awarded in the Berlin Panorama section in 2024), Haugerud delivers in “Dreams” a work that dialogues both with the legacy of Scandinavian family drama cinema and the vibrancy of new authorial voices through its frank and undramatic portrayal of the turbulence of youth.
The plot set in Oslo revolves around Johanne, portrayed by newcomer Ella Øverbye. A 17-year-old introverted and dreamy teenager, Johanne lives with her single mother, Kristin (Ane Dahl Torp, from “The Wave”), and maintains a strong bond with her grandmother Karin (Anne Marit Jacobsen), an elderly poet. Johanne’s life gains color and upheaval with the arrival of a new literature teacher at school: Johanna (Selome Emnetu), a charismatic, intelligent, and beautiful woman who immediately captivates the class – and, in particular, ignites a profound admiration in Johanne. What begins as a typical teenage crush on an authority figure evolves into a silent obsession. The teenager, who until then felt her existence was dull, starts to live for being close to the teacher, nurturing romantic fantasies and recording her feverish feelings in a diary.
Platonic love, however, leads her to increasing suffering when she realizes that it is impossible to materialize: the young woman falls into depression, isolating herself even more. In a moment of desperation and boldness, Johanne goes to Johanna’s house without warning – a crucial scene in which, under the rain, the student knocks on the teacher’s door, crying. To Johanne’s (and the audience’s) surprise, the teacher embraces her with a long and affectionate hug. The doubt that lingers is: how far did this gesture go? Had Johanna responded in some way to Johanne’s love, or was it all just a comforting misunderstanding? The answer is not immediate. “Dreams” adopts an unconventional structure: the narrative progresses after this incident but does not clarify it right away. Instead, it reveals that Johanne wrote a kind of fictionalized memoir recounting her supposed romantic relationship with Johanna. The manuscript, titled “Dreams” (hence the title of the film), is shown by the teenager hesitantly first to her grandmother Karin – who is stunned by the confessional and sensual content of the text – and then reaches the hands of her mother, who reacts with shock and concern. The two older women find themselves forced to confront the possibility that Johanne may have experienced something beyond the acceptable limits with the teacher. The film intriguingly alternates between scenes from everyday life after the events (with Johanne becoming increasingly withdrawn and Johanna transferred to another school), and flashbacks and imaginings of what might have happened between the student and the teacher.
The cast performs in perfect harmony, capturing the nuances of each generation involved. Despite her young age, Ella Øverbye delivers an extraordinary performance: through voice-overs taken from Johanne’s diary, she gives voice to the typical yearnings and anxieties of adolescence with disconcertingly honest narration. Her scenes of indirect confrontation with her mother and grandmother – such as when she realizes they have read her intimate text – are heartbreakingly vulnerable. Ane Dahl Torp embodies Kristin, the mother, as a woman torn between anger and fear: her initial reaction is to want to punish the teacher for possible abuse, but as she reads her daughter’s writings, she also feels admiration and hidden envy for the depth of those feelings, reflecting on her own mediocre love life. Anne Marit Jacobsen brings tragic density to the grandmother Karin: once a somewhat renowned poet, she finds herself outdated by her granddaughter’s literary daring and faces the painful realization that perhaps she lacked passion in her youth. This family dynamic is the heart of the film, and Haugerud directs it with long, frank dialogues full of ambiguity – often what is left unsaid weighs as much as the spoken words. Selome Emnetu, as the teacher Johanna, has a charismatic and enigmatic presence; although she has relatively few scenes, her character looms over the entire narrative.
In terms of form, “Dreams” allows itself to transgress traditional script “rules,” with long voice-overs – excerpts from Johanne’s book – that progressively replace dialogue in certain scenes, so we see actions accompanied by narration of the past, creating an effect of intertwined dream and memory. This choice could sound heavy, but Haugerud achieves lightness, punctuating these sequences with a touch of irony. The narrative is intentionally fragmented: the viewer is prompted to piece together the puzzle of what really happened, since the director deliberately withholds key scenes of the supposed romance until the last third of the film.
As a technical supplement, there is no melodramatic soundtrack underscoring emotions, but rather the buzz of conversations in cafes, the awkward silence of a family living room after a revelation, or the sound of pages turning as Karin reads her granddaughter’s manuscript. These sound details highlight the director’s intention to preserve realism and avoid manipulating the audience for an obvious reaction. At times, the film also presents nearly surreal images, blurred in the light of dusk, literally illustrating the “dreams” of the title. This mix of realism and daydreaming is skillfully handled, never misleadingly confusing the audience, but rather reflecting the protagonist’s confusion between reality and imagination.
It’s no surprise that Dreams has won international critical acclaim. The victory in Berlin was accompanied by praise for the film’s courage in tackling a delicate subject – the infatuation of a minor with her teacher – from such an original angle. Far from sensationalism or easy moral lessons, Haugerud explores the gray areas of emotions and questions the narratives of victim and perpetrator. In addition to notably concluding Haugerud’s trilogy, the film stands on its own as a delicate and provocative work about the dreams (and disillusionments) that mark the passage into adulthood.
HIDDEN POINT
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The German mystery thriller crosses borders to tell a story of conspiracy and horror on the fringes of Turkey. Directed and written by Ayşe Polat, a filmmaker born in Turkey and based in Germany, the film carries a unique perspective: Polat, who has Kurdish heritage, infuses her work with her concerns about political and cultural issues from her homeland, using the framework of paranormal suspense to explore collective traumas.
Screened in the Encounters section of the Berlin Film Festival 2023, a space dedicated to bold auteur voices, the production drew attention for its partially found footage format and the way it combines genre elements – horror, spy thriller – with a deeply rooted thematic focus on historical dramas, such as the conflict between the Turkish state and the Kurdish minority. The story follows three narrative cores that converge throughout the film. In a remote village, a team of German documentarians is filming an ethnographic movie. At the forefront of the group is Simone (Katja Bürkle), an idealistic director interested in telling the local story. While filming, they accidentally record a peculiar scene: an elderly woman performs a ritual at dusk, lighting candles and chanting prayers in front of an empty door – we learn that she honors her son who disappeared 25 years ago, supposedly abducted during the conflict in the region.
In parallel, Zafer (Ahmet Varlı), a Turkish man, arrives at the location under a false identity, presenting himself as an employee of an electric company. In reality, Zafer is a secret agent working for a dark organization linked to the government, and his mission in that place is initially unclear. He brings along his 7-year-old daughter, Melek (Çağla Yurga), perhaps to facilitate his cover by pretending to be a widowed father on assignment. The child is curious, with big and attentive eyes, and quickly forms bonds with Leyla (Aybi Era), a young local who acts as the translator for the German team and, in addition, becomes Melek’s babysitter while Zafer carries out his “inspections.” It is through Melek’s perspective that strange elements begin to manifest: the girl reports seeing an unknown man watching her in the woods and hears whispers in a language she doesn’t understand. Leyla and Simone, the documentary director, initially think these are childish imaginings – the team faces more concrete problems, such as the subtle hostility of authorities in allowing them to film certain subjects. But as Melek starts having intense nightmares and episodes of apparent trance, even in front of the camera, everyone becomes concerned. Zafer, torn between his loyalty to the organization he works for and his love for his daughter, begins to fear that something is haunting her.
The plots intertwine in a rising rhythm of suspense. The film crew discovers that 25 years ago, a secret military operation occurred in the village, never fully explained – possibly involving forced disappearances of Kurdish-origin residents, including the old woman’s son from the ritual. Simone wants to bring this truth to light in her documentary, which puts her on a collision course with Zafer, whose mission gradually reveals itself to be linked to covering up (or monitoring) these dangerous memories. At the same time, Melek is influenced by an invisible force: at one point, she begins to speak words in Kurdish – a language she doesn’t know – quoting names and ancient facts. The suggestion that the spirit of the disappeared boy may be trying to communicate through the girl gives the film a tantalizing supernatural tone.
Ayşe Polat skillfully navigates ambiguity: is serious Melek really the mouthpiece of a ghost, or is she reacting psychologically to the charged environment filled with secrets? The duality persists until the climax, when the interests of all characters collide in a tense night, leading to a tragic and cathartic resolution.
Received as a breath of novelty within the thriller genre, “Hidden Point” boldly alternates languages: parts of the film are shown through the documentary camera lens of Simone, in a found footage style, with shaky images and improvised framing; other parts adopt a traditional suspense photography, with carefully composed shots that explore the claustrophobia of the environments – dark corridors, the forest at night – and the contrast between the natural beauty of the landscape and the latent tension. This blend serves to reinforce the theme of overlap between reality and narrative, suggesting that sometimes we only see “part” of the truth (the so-called blind spot of the title). The atmosphere is imbued with paranoia: static noises on devices, whispered conversations intercepted, and a sound design that incorporates local sounds (distorted) to create subtle scares. For example, the distant hoot of an owl merges with a human lament in a scene where Simone reviews the recordings and notices something strange. The music track, which is discreet and punctual, was composed by the collective Dynamedion and favors deep electronic tones, almost subliminal, intensifying the sense of imminent danger. When the supernatural element emerges, the film does not resort to excessive digital effects – instead, it relies on the power of suggestion and precise editing to unsettle the viewer. A memorable sequence involves the projection of the tapes recorded by the team: while watching a nighttime recording, they notice a shadow behind Melek that shouldn’t be there; the frozen frame of this figure becomes a symbol of the ghosts (real or metaphorical) haunting that place.
More than a horror about a possessed child or a suspense with a secret agent in conflict, the film is a reflection on the “ghosts” generated by state violence and the denial of truths.
BREAKING RULES
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Inspired by a true story that went around the world, the American drama focuses on the courage of young women who challenge fundamentalist oppression in the name of education and science. Directed by Bill Guttentag, a two-time Oscar-winning filmmaker for documentaries, the film has a high-impact cultural backdrop: it is based on the journey of the first all-girls robotics team from Afghanistan, which gained international recognition in mid-2017.
Roya (Nikohl Boosheri, from “Circunstância”) is a young visionary who believes in the transformative power of education. Under a fundamentalist government that prohibits girls from attending school, she decides to challenge the prohibitions and secretly create a learning space for local girls. Supported by a few allies—including Samir (Ali Fazal, from “Victoria and Abdul”), an idealist who sees the potential of those young minds—Roya teaches computer science and robotics to a group of curious and talented teenagers. When her students build a robot prototype and manage to compete in an international technology fair, their achievement catches the attention of the outside world, proving that even in the most unlikely places, innovation and female capability flourish. However, this success brings growing risks: while the girls’ victory makes headlines around the globe, it also ignites the anger of conservative local leaders. Rumors spread, veiled threats begin to loom over Roya and her pupils, and the film intensifies its tone, showing the dilemma between continuing with the “rebellion” of knowledge or stepping back to protect their own lives.
“Breaking Rules” follows the tradition of films about liberating education and academic achievement. The difference is the specific focus: the intersection of cutting-edge technology – robotics, programming – with the basic struggle for the right to learn. This contrast yields powerful scenes, such as the girls operating battered laptops in a clandestine basement while religious chants can be heard outside, or when they first see skyscrapers illuminated in a foreign city during the robotics competition, catching a glimpse of a world of possibilities. The film also addresses contemporary issues of inclusion in technology: it reminds us that, even in the most remote places, girls can and want to participate in the digital revolution if given the opportunity. Guttentag, with his documentary background, incorporates archival footage from real news broadcasts reporting on the “Afghan Dreamers” (as the real robotics team became known), blurring the lines between fiction and reality to emphasize the larger context of human rights.
The production also featured consulting from Roya Mahboob, the real Afghan technology entrepreneur whose life story inspired the protagonist – an involvement that ensured fidelity to actual events.
THE SILENCE OF THE OYSTERS
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One of the most impactful Brazilian films of the year delves into the reality of mining tragedies. The acclaimed documentary filmmaker Marcos Pimentel, who has been portraying Brazilian stories through documentary lens for over two decades, makes his fiction debut with the feature-length film that exposes the human losses and environmental destruction resulting from mining activities. According to the director himself, the decision came from the realization that, as a documentary filmmaker, he wouldn’t be able to film the activities of the mining companies – an institutionally and physically shielded universe – but fiction would allow him to speak about reality with creative freedom, bypassing access barriers.
The work took shape through extensive interviews with victims and witnesses of disasters such as the dam bursts in Mariana (2015) and Brumadinho (2019). Not surprisingly, the film incorporates actual footage from these tragedies, blurring the boundaries between documentary recording and staging.
Presented first at the 2024 Rio Film Festival, it follows the journey of Kailane, a fictional character composed from various real-life stories. The character was born in the early 1980s in a workers’ village in Minas Gerais, built around a large mining complex. Since childhood, she witnesses the landscape change drastically: mountains turning into craters, clear rivers becoming muddy streams. The film is structured in chapters that correspond to phases of Kailane’s life, always contextualized by significant mining events in the state. In her childhood, Kailane (played by the young Lavínia Castelari) loses her father in a workplace accident at the mine—a blast caused by negligence claims the lives of several employees, echoing real cases often suppressed. The girl grows up shy, developing a rich inner world to cope with her grief: she talks to insects and plants, as if seeking comfort in the remaining nature. In her adolescence, another blow: her family and entire community must hastily abandon the village due to the risk of a nearby dam breaking. Amid the forced exodus, Kailane sees friends scatter and the cohesion of her family unravel.
As an adult, Kailane (now portrayed by Bárbara Colen from “Bacurau”) returns to the region as a kind of solitary wanderer, only to find a desolate landscape. This is when a catastrophic dam collapse occurs – clearly inspired by the tragedy in Mariana, with tons of waste sweeping through settlements. The film doesn’t spare the harshness in these sequences: Pimentel inserts real images of the mudslide swallowing houses and churches, blending them with Kailane’s journey. The character, who had stayed in the region in the hope of finding one of her missing siblings, becomes a victim of this disaster herself, seeing the little that remained of her past swallowed by the tragedy. The silence evoked in the title refers both to the suffocating silence of the oysters – a metaphor for those who remained silent or were silenced in the face of injustices – and the silence that remains after people leave and communities die.
Among the professional actors, Lucas Oranmian stands out as Kailane’s older brother, whose departure to look for a job in the big city symbolizes forced exile; and Lira Ribas as the protagonist’s mother, a woman who goes from combativeness – she leads a protest for better conditions in the mine – to exhaustion and disbelief as the years of struggle pass. At the end, what is seen on screen is not just characters and special effects, but a reflection of reality itself transformed into cinematic language.
WHEN BRAZIL WAS MODERN
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The Brazilian documentary rescues a vibrant period in national history when architecture, politics, and society walked hand in hand toward the construction of a modern identity. Directed by Fabiano Maciel, it was screened at the 2025 É Tudo Verdade Film Festival, where it received an honorable mention from the jury, attesting to the quality of its research and narrative.
The title “When Brazil Was Modern” immediately evokes a curious nostalgia: there was a time when the country was ahead of its time, revolutionizing aesthetics and ideas. With historical rigor and cultural sensitivity, the work has one of its foundations in the book “Modern and Brazilian,” by architect and curator Lauro Cavalcanti, whose work on modernism served as inspiration and conceptual basis for the script. Maciel, a seasoned Rio Grande do Sul documentary filmmaker based in São Paulo, had previously explored the architectural universe in earlier works – he was co-screenwriter of the acclaimed “Oscar Niemeyer – A Life of Breath” (2007) – and now broadens his perspective beyond Niemeyer, contemplating modernism and its profound implications.
The documentary highlights that buildings are not neutral: the director argues that every floor plan and every column erected in the past were expressions of nation-building projects. By revisiting this legacy, the film inevitably prompts questions about the present. In its final part, it contrasts the modernist ideal—which combined aesthetic innovation with social engagement, translating the dream of a more just and developed Brazil—with the political and urban missteps of subsequent decades. Current images of abandoned or altered modernist buildings across the country illustrate a certain melancholy: as the narration asks, “Where did we go wrong by abandoning the ideals of excellence and progress that marked the peak of modern architecture?” And further: “What does today’s urban landscape reveal about our journey as a nation?” These open-ended questions invite the viewer to reflect on iconic buildings as silent protagonists in our history.