Review: Betânia

Desert Bloom

By Maíra Oliveira

Betânia, directed by Marcelo Botta (Brazil, 2024, Première Brasil) is a film which transcends a simple narrative to become a tribute to the strength of the women from Maranhão and their deep connection between their identity and territory. With a premiere at the Berlinale and showcased at Rio de Janeiro Int’l Film Festival, it builds an intimate connection between Betânia, the character, and the city of the same name, proposing the idea of the body-territory, where the leading character dissolves into the earth she inhabits.

Betânia’s story is also told by the region’s sounds— the wind, voices and traditional songs, steps on dry earth. These sonorous elements transform the environment into an additional character, revealing how the past and ancestry invade the present. Sound guides the narrative, offering a peculiar rhythm which makes the experience sensory and immersive.

Betânia’s strength is reflected in the stories of the women who surround her. Here the  focus is not on individual heroism, but in how the life of the leading character illumines the collective, becoming a mosaic of experiences which reveal life’s complexity in a land marked by resistance. The film englobes the concept of “Desert Bloom”, suggesting that even in apparently hostile environments, beauty and strength can be found. Betânia, like her city, blooms despite adversity.

The character who gives her name to the film also gives birth to waves of resistance — a creative process which goes beyond survival and celebrates the capacity to imagine the future, even with so many limitations. Betânia is an invitation to reflection that female bodies, especially black ones, are territories of struggle and creation. Marcelo Botta conveys this complexity through images and sounds which converse with the poetry of daily life, revealing life which persists and resists, even in the most barren places.

In the end, Betânia is not only the portrait of a community in Maranhão, but a testimony to feminine resiliency. It is a celebration of the will to live and create, showing that, even during droughts, the desert can bloom.