Portuguese producer defends commercial cinema pass message

O director Rui Pedro Sousa and the producer Sonia Resende premiere on Thursday, in the cinemas, the comedy “Sin lives above”, realizing the idea of “making commercial films, with quality and pass a message”.

“In Portugal there is still a little reserve in relation to commercial cinema, which can and should be synonymous with quality. I try to always have a quality character, but there is always a reservation”, said Sonia Resende, producer of Station Productions, in an interview with the agency Lusa.

“Sin lives on top” is the second fiction film by Rui Pedro Sousa and Station Productions, after “Bloodless Revolution” (2024) and was recorded last summer in Porto with Brazilian actors Miguel Falabella and Marisa Orth and the Portuguese Inês Aires Pereira and Pedro Carvalho.

The story features a couple of Brazilian immigrants who decide to invite a young Portuguese couple who live in an apartment upstairs in a building in Porto.

The action takes place during the dinner, during which it reveals the weariness of the intimate relationship of the Brazilian couple, older, and the doubts about the intense relationship of the young couple settle.

“Sin lives above” has the argument of Brazilian creative Edson Athayde from a play and film by Spanish author Cesc Gay who has been adapted several times for cinema, namely in “The Invitation” (2026), by Olivia Wilde.

On the Portuguese adaptation, Sonia Resende explained that she wanted “something intelligent, something well written” without being a breezy comedy, which confronted the idea of more conservative and more liberal love relations and had some connection to Portuguese and Brazilian culture.

“ And he tries to talk about fractured issues like emigration in Portugal. We are a country of emigrants and we must be sensitive to welcome those who seek our country for better living conditions,” he said.

Although several versions of the film have already been made, Sonia Resende believes that “Sin lives above” will attract spectators in Portugal.

“ What we've seen in the theaters is that it's comedies that sell the most and we have to re-educate the audience. I wanted to do a comedy with the essence of social justice, talking about relationships. No one will leave this film indifferent. I think we can make quality commercial films and send a message and that is what producers, distributors and the like often do not understand here”, he said.

“Sin lives above” has funding from the Cinema and Audiovisual Institute and the tax incentive “cash hits”, but the support is mostly private, “with the proper return of brands in terms of visibility”.

“ I thank the Ministry of Culture for having been sensitive and legally extended the application of the concept of cultural patronage, but I still think that it is important to have another kind of benefits for companies that support Portuguese cinema and culture in general; that are even tax benefits, whatever it is ", defended the producer.

About the next projects, after “Revolution (without) blood”, which was seen by about 21,000 spectators, and “Sin lives above”, which opens on Thursday, the producer is already preparing the next film, which will be an adaptation of the novel “Sugar Bread”, by Afonso Reis Cabral.

The novel addresses the true case of Gisberta Salce's death, a trans-Brazilian woman, after being attacked by young people between the ages of 12 and 16 in 2006, in Porto.

“ I'm a lawyer, besides being a producer, and all films have to have a very large social and justice character. It has already been so in ‘Revolution (without) blood’. Here [in ‘Sin lives above’] is the issue of immigration and relations and in Gisberta I want to follow this path”, explained Sonia Resende.