Pedágio

Suellen, a Brazilian toll-booth attendant, falls in with a gang of thieves in an attempt to keep her family afloat. She realises she can use her job to raise some extra money illegally for a ‘noble’ cause: to send her son to expensive conversion therapy.

Suellen works as a toll booth attendant outside of São Paulo while her queer son, Antonio, uploads flamboyant videos online. Ashamed of the videos and ridiculed by her colleagues, Suellen is distraught by her son’s sexual orientation. A co-worker suggests Antonio should seek help from a foreign pastor-guru who runs a conversion therapy programme. To cover the programme’s expensive fees, Suellen raises money by helping criminals target the wealthy commuters passing through her toll booth.

Maeve Jinkings delivers a fierce performance as Suellen in this realist drama. Set within a bleak industrial landscape, the different narrative threads weave together a meditative portrait of familial love, class, religious pressure, and queer emancipation.