The Laboratorio d’Arte Cinematografica is hosting a free lecture on 26 February dedicated to an analysis of the film The Secret Agent (2025), written and directed by Kleber Mendonça Filho and nominated for four Academy Awards: Best Picture, Best International Feature Film, Best Actor in a Leading Role, and Best Casting. The event will take place from 3.30 pm to 5.30 pm at the venue in Via Carlo Emery 47, Rome. Alberto Crespi and Massimo Intoppa CCS will engage in a conversation exploring not only the film’s themes but also its linguistic, stylistic and production aspects, offering participants a critical perspective on how contemporary cinema revisits recent history and the imagery it has generated.
The Secret Agent portrays moral tensions and historical conflicts in Brazil in ’77, favouring a visual construction that engages in dialogue with classic genre models while updating them.
In 1977 Brazil was under a military dictatorship established by the 1964 coup d’état, which had overthrown the democratic government of João Goulart. It was an authoritarian regime led by the Armed Forces, marked by the suspension of political freedoms, press censorship, restrictions on political parties and the repression of opposition through arrests, torture and the exile of intellectuals, students and activists. In 1977 the president-general was Ernesto Geisel (in office from 1974 to 1979), a key figure in the so-called phase of ‘slow, gradual and secure’ détente (abertura): a controlled transition initiated by the military themselves in order to move progressively away from the regime without relinquishing political control. Despite this declared opening, in 1977 the system remained fully authoritarian – executive power was dominant, Parliament had limited functions and national security continued to justify repressive measures. Democracy would be restored only in the 1980s, with the formal end of the dictatorship in 1985.
The lecture aims to turn the screening of the film into an opportunity for study, placing at its centre the relationship between narrative, mise-en-scène and cinematography, in keeping with the Laboratory’s teaching approach, which has always sought to combine theoretical analysis with close attention to the crafts of cinema. Admission is free, with booking via WhatsApp on +39 3273415262, subject to availability.
