We can bring to characters dark and bright sides that nobody even dreams about.

You see all these old buildings [in Rio] going down or catching fire overnight, and it is so sad. I am very connected with these buildings because they are our history. It is the only one that we have.

In Brazil, there is a fear and a denial of our past. Downtown Rio used to display the history of colonialism in Brazil. They had beautiful buildings and theaters, and there was a bakery that was threatened to be demolished, but people insisted against it. They laid down in front of it and said, "You're going to have to go over my body to destroy it." It frustrates me when I see people on Facebook posing in front of old buildings while on vacation, because they could've posed in front of equally beautiful buildings at home in Rio.

I just hope the film [Aquarius] doesn't feel overly nostalgic because too much nostalgia for me leads to depression. I think Clara is very pragmatic.

Nobody who comes out of the movie [Aquarius] focuses on those [sexual] scenes, because they are not the heart of the film. They are a consequence of the story, but I don't remember hearing audiences talking about them afterward. They came out discussing themes of resistance, history and memory. They're talking about the beauty of the self and how it can become demolished.

I have two kids now and through watching them, I keep having flashbacks to my own childhood.

The film [Aquarius" ] is very, very successful. We had the highest per-screen average of last week's releases.