Here’s another fantastic Brazilian historical political film, following on from 2023’s excellent biographical drama I’m Still Here. The Secret Agent (O Agente Secreto) launched in 2025, was written and directed by Kleber Mendonça Filho, and it was one of the best films of the year.
It stars Wagner Moura in the lead and is two hours and forty minutes of slow burner, subversive, inventive intrigue that covers a wide range of genres. It doesn’t hit peak form 100% of the time, but its best moments are exceptional and the conclusion offers a great sense of emotional payoff.
Recife the Safehaven in The Secret Agent
This isn’t a film about a secret agent, which is one of the many curious things about it. There are a bunch of genres playing together at once, plus an occasional side plot for a severed Hairy Leg (see addendum) found in a shark.
Set in the summer of 1977 in Brazil, most of the story follows the former engineering researcher Marcelo. He’s on the run in the Brazilian military dictatorship and seeks refuge in Recife, the capital of Pernambuco.
In the opening scene, the tone of the film is set. A sense of bizarre occurrences and a non-normal, where corrupt police officers try to fleece him, and a dead body is left unattended as it’s dead, so boring to the cops.
His real name is Armando Solimões, but a political resistance movement gives him the name Armando to try and protect his whereabouts. Nevertheless, a contract killing is placed on him and he plans to flee the country, viewed as he is as a “communist”.
Whilst he waits for relevant passport details, he hopes to reunite with his young son, but also works a job in the city’s idetntity card department.
Away from that, occasional scenes cut to modern day Brazil where some young historians are researching his story. They listen to old interviews and search old newspaper articles for clues on what happened to Marcelo.
Getting a sense of the film is the below, with music by Retiro: Tema de Amor Número 3 by Conjunto Concerto Viola. You get the sense of upbeat dread, as the laidback Armando/Marcelo goes about his fight for survival in sweltering heat.
This all builds to the closing segments, where the contract killers hone in on him. It all turns into a hellish mess and that scene (which we’re not putting here because spoilers) is very well done and tense.
History student Flavia then closes out proceedings on her university campus, discovering online what finally happened.
This section, bringing the story forward almost 50 years, weighs The Secret Agent in a sense of emotional history. It’s really in the days after watching the film did we realise its emotional impact, as it’s a tale of political strife and good people trying to lead normal lives amongst corruption and fascism.
Lead actor Wagner Moura is very much the star of the show, with a very natural performance, his character almost seems detached from reality. As if to distance himself from the corruption around him.
The supporting cast is quite vast, with all manner of different people punctuating the experience, making for a diverse and rich experience that breathes so much life into the film. Ironic, then, that core themes of The Secret Agent should be violence and death.
The Production of The Secret Agent
The film was a good financial success, earning $22.5 million off a $5 million budget (making it the highest grossing Brazilian release of 2025). What it does with that smaller budget is very impressive as the film looks fantastic, really selling the idea its 1977 Brazil.
That alongside the great acting, a pertinent story, has turned The Secret Agent into a big awards contender. It got a bunch of Oscar and Golden Globe nominations, plus won two big awards at Cannes.
Despite that, it’s had a very limited theatrical run outside of Brazil and North America (although it played in France for a spell). It’s not screened here in the UK, sadly, so we had to rent and stream it online (first world problems etc.).
Director Kleber Mendonça Filho wrote the screenplay across three years. Once greenlit, it was a co-production across Brazilian, French, German, and Dutch studios (smaller independent films often split the funding like that).
Filming took 10 weeks in 2024, with the shoot on location in Recife. Looks like a fabulous place!
Again, the film is critically acclaimed. We should imagine this will rapidly become a cult classic and be recognised as one of the best films of the 2020s.
ADDENDUM ALERT!!! The Hairy Leg in Brazilian Urban Legend
Right, every now and then in The Secret Agent there’s a subplot about a severed hairy leg. At one point, in a break from tone, there’s a scene where it goes on a rampage and starts attacking people in the street.
Those bits are entirely different from the rest of The Secret Agent, which in most instances has a strong focus on realism and a quietly subversive approach to proceedings.
The reason these scenes are there is down to The Hairy Leg (perna cabeluda) Brazilian urban legend. The story hails from Recife in the 1970s, with the newspaper Diário de Pernambuco inventing a story about this leg to replace news items that Brazil’s military dictatorship would constantly censor.
That’s not explained in The Secret Agent, so first time viewers (and most of the watching world outside of Brazil) will be baffled by what The Hairy Leg represents.
But once you look into the reason, the purpose all makes sense.
It’s been put to use quite a lot in Brazilian culture, also appearing in comics and music. The manguebeat band Chico Science & Nação Zumbi flagged the song in the 1994 song Banditismo Por Uma Questão de Classe.
The Secret Agent now keeps the legend alive, stronger than ever! 🦵
