Director: Tiago Melo Cast: Rejane Faria, Valmir do Côco, Spencer Callahan, Tânia Maria : Brazil – 97’ – 2026
Mosquito bites are itchy but they also carry disease and viruses like dengue fever particularly prevalent in the tropical climates and in Picuí, deep in Brazil’s Northeastern Paraíba backlands, where this unusual film unfolds. Here local scientists have been working on a method to combat the problem that involves radioactive uranium. When their experiments fail, a small group of scientists and miners rally round to save the day in this unusual feature premiering in the main Tiger Competition at this year’s Rotterdam Film Festival.
Yellow Cake is based on a script co-written by Amanda Guimarães, Anna Carolina Francisco, Jeronimo Lemos, and Gabriel Domingues and Tiago Melo puts an inventive spin on his sophomore outing – described as “a pulpy, politically charged sci-fi fusing local myth, dark humour, working-class grit and radioactivity.”
Like most developing countries Brazil is a socially polarised nation with a small wealthy population outnumbered by a massive working class that here faces ‘the storm troopers of global capital’ (another quote from the festival bumph).
South American cinema makes ample use of magic realism, as seen recently in The Secret Agent and this technique, along with folkloric flourishes i wheeled out it not only to add a mystic and cinematic quality to Melo’s second feature but also to make the scientific subject more reachable (and quite frankly less dry) as we soon discover. Yellow Cake still takes its time get going with the various elements finally coalescing into an intriguing, if also baffling, Brazilian sci-if thriller.
ROTTERDAM INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL | 29 JANUARY- 8 FEBRUARY 2026