The Film Baby Review: A Sharp Depiction of Queer Brazilian Hustlers Adrift in the Established Order
Capturing the metropolitan unease and pulsating life of São Paulo, director Marcelo Caetano's unflinching drama centres on those who exist on the margins of an ever-changing metropolis. Fresh out of juvenile prison, 18-year-old Wellington (the actor João Pedro Mariano) finds himself at a crossroads; left behind by his parents, the impressionable young man finds solace in the arms of others.
On an late-night excursion with his boisterous group of gay and non-binary friends, Wellington crosses paths with Ronaldo (Ricardo Teodoro), a hunky, charismatic hustler over double his age. Shrouded in the wavering neon of a XXX cinema, their initial encounter is intimate and charged, with an edge of danger. Ronaldo quickly introduces Wellington to the underground scene of sex work and selling drugs.
A Study of Empathy Rather Than Sensationalism
The director portrays Wellington’s new life of crime with compassionate understanding instead of as a sensationalist cautionary tale. Now using the alias Baby, he enters his commercial trysts with brash fearlessness and touching naivety. To his customers, Wellington offers more than his youth and his body, but also instances of tenderness.
In the hectic energy of São Paulo, filled with bustling alleyways and colourful shopfronts, there’s a deep-seated solitude, as unmoored souls grasp at one another for fleeting joy.
"The city are fraught with peril, yet they are the place where they can forge familial bonds, too."
A Complex Dynamic of Love and Control
Ronaldo is at once a romantic interest and a protective father figure to Wellington, but their bond is sabotaged by possessiveness and economic precarity. Intimidation from dubious individuals in the underworld seem minor next to the dread of state surveillance and imprisonment, epitomized by the hovering figures of police officers making their rounds.
Baby is most powerful as an astute portrait of the disenfranchised individuals who have been failed by the social system. The film stands as a moving examination into survival, chosen family, and the pursuit of identity within a harsh urban landscape.
