Winner of the Golden Leopard, the top honor at the Locarno Film Festival, Rule 34 is a scalding hot and assuredly feminist investigation of the crowded intersection of sexuality, gender, race, and politics in contemporary Brazil. Young, Black, bisexual law student Simone (a captivating Sol Miranda in her film debut) pays for school by moonlighting as a camgirl. Aiming to keep these two facets of her life separate, these two worlds nevertheless become entwined in one another as Simone discovers a passion for representing women in abuse cases and begins experimenting with BDSM and kink in her sex life.

Can a person ever really separate the mind and the body? Living in a country with the fifth-highest femicide rate, can Simone find her vocation as a legal advocate for vulnerable women while developing a taste for sadomasochism in her sex life, on- and off-camera? Are these things in direct conflict with each other, or somehow in concert? In Júlia Murat’s ambitious and engrossing third feature, these are just a few of the questions considered.

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