The Riverbank — Matheus Farias & Enock Carvalho

Five years after Inabitável played Sundance, Matheus Farias and Enock Carvalho have a first feature, and it goes straight into Locarno’s international competition as a world premiere. A Margem do Rio follows a young Black gay man and former evangelical through Recife, and the pair move it between erotic thriller, tropical noir and something closer to magical realism rather than settling on one. Premium Films and MPM Premium took international sales this week, before a public screening exists to sell. Farias and Carvalho have been partners professionally and privately for thirteen years. Recife did the rest: a decade of work out of Pernambuco made the city legible to programmers, and this is the first debut to walk through that door. Screens 5 to August 15.