🔗 Share this article Baby Review: A Sharp Depiction of LGBTQ+ Brazilian Survivors Lost in the Established Order Channelling the city's relentless energy and vibrancy of São Paulo, Marcelo Caetano’s gripping drama centres on those who live on the fringes of an constantly evolving metropolis. Recently released from juvenile prison, 18-year-old Wellington (the actor João Pedro Mariano) faces a critical turning point; deserted by his parents, the wide-eyed young man finds solace in the arms of others. On an late-night excursion with his rowdy group of LGBTQ+ and gender non-conforming friends, Wellington meets Ronaldo (actor Ricardo Teodoro), a muscular, charming hustler more than twice his age. Shrouded in the wavering neon of a neon-lit porn cinema, their initial encounter is intimate and charged, with an tinge of peril. Ronaldo promptly ushers Wellington to the underground scene of prostitution and drug dealing. A Portrait of Understanding Instead of Exploitation Caetano depicts Wellington’s new life of crime with compassionate understanding as opposed to as a melodramatic morality play. Now adopting the moniker Baby, he approaches his transactional encounters with brash fearlessness and touching naivety. To his clients, Wellington provides not just his youth and his body, but also fleeting acts of kindness. In the electrifying chaos of São Paulo, overflowing with crowded backstreets and colourful shopfronts, there’s a gnawing loneliness, as rootless people grasp at one another for temporary happiness. "The urban landscape are fraught with peril, yet they are where they can discover chosen kin, too." A Complex Relationship of Love and Control Ronaldo is both a lover and a guardian-like mentor to Wellington, but their connection is thrown off course by possessiveness and economic precarity. Threats from shady figures in the shadow economy pale in comparison to the fear of government monitoring and jail time, epitomized by the hovering figures of police officers in the area. Baby is especially potent as an astute portrait of the forgotten souls who have fallen through the cracks the system. The film stands as a heartfelt examination into resilience, non-biological kinship, and the pursuit of identity within a unforgiving urban landscape.