The Fever review – dreamy film about a mysterious illness in Brazil

Maya Da-Rin's subtle, poetic debut engages with the hidden lives of the Desana people of Brazil

Here is a mysterious and opaque movie, a feature debut from 42-year-old Brazilian artist and film-maker Maya Da-Rin. It does not give up its meaning easily, or perhaps at all. Newcomer Regis Myrupu won the best actor prize at the Locarno film festival for his understated performance as Justino, a member of the indigenous Desana people working as a security guard at a container port in Manaus harbour in northern Brazil. He is a widower, fussed over by his affectionate daughter Vanessa (Rosa Peixoto), who has just got into medical school at Brasilia and will have to move away very soon and may not see her dad for many years. And perhaps that is what has caused a strange, profound unease in Justino. He suffers from a fever which is resistant to diagnosis. He becomes dreamy and inattentive at work and is called to see the stern head of human resources, who after some perfunctory inquiries about his mental health gives him a warning.