Brazilian media has reported the death of filmmaker Cássio Pereira dos Santos at the age of 42 of undisclosed causes. His short films were screened at numerous film festivals and his 2020 debut feature film Valentina, an inspiring and hopeful story of gender expression and solidarity, starring popular trans YouTuber Thiessa Woinbackk in their cinematic breakthrough performance, played at numerous international film festivals.
Born in 1980 in Minas Gerais, Pereira dos Santos studied filmmaking at University of Brasília, where he directed fictional and documentary projects. After finishing film school in 2003, he wrote and directed eight shorts films, among them The Scarecrow Girl and Marina’s Ocean.
His works have been selected at several international film festivals, such as the Aspen ShortsFest, Palm Springs ShortFest, Rhode Island Film Festival, the London Int'l Documentary Festival, Tokyo Short Shorts, Fribourg Int'l Film Festival (Switzerland), Chicago Int'l Children’s Film Festival, DC Shorts Film Fest (Washington), TIFF Kids Toronto, Sapporo Short Fest, Hamburg Shorts Festival, São Paulo International Film Festival, Prix Jeunesse Munich, Mostra de Cinema de Tiradentes, Brasília Film Festival, Rio Int’l Short Film Festival (Curta Cinema) and more.
His films have received around 50 awards, such as audience awards in Tokyo, New Deli, Rio, and Washington DC. As a writer, Cássio contributed to films such as Guigo Offlline, an LGBTQ feature project for Brazilian television, which won Best Brazilian Feature Film Award at Mix Brasil Film Festival.
In 2020, he debuted his debut feature film Valentina, telling the story of a seventeen-year-old girl who moves to the countryside of Brazil with her mother, Márcia (played by renowned actress Guta Stresser), for a fresh start. To avoid being bullied at her new school, Valentina attempts to enroll with her new name, hoping to keep her personal gender history private. However, the girl and her mother quickly face dilemmas when the local high school needs the signature of the father (played by Rômulo Braga) for enrollment.
Valentina had its world premiere at the Outfest Film Festival in Los Angeles, where its protagonist Thiessa Woinbackk won the Best Performance Award. The film also played at other international film festivals including OUTshine LGBTQ+ Film Festival in Miami and Fort Lauderdale, Seattle, Cine Latino in Minneapolis Saint Paul, BFI Flare, Warsaw, and MIX Copenhagen. It also played at the São Paulo Film Festival, where it won the Audience Award, and at the Mix Brasil Film Festival, winning the award for Best Film, Best Screenplay, Best Performance, and Audience Award. Pereira dos Santos was currently working on his second feature Alírio in the City.
