The Lights of Niterói

Quintanilha (Listen, Beautiful Márcia) navigates the unsteady currents of male friendship in this propulsive tale of fishing and football set along the working-class beaches across from Rio de Janeiro in 1950s Guanabara Bay, Brazil. When Hélcio—a headstrong pro soccer prospect—spots a boat dynamite-fishing, he convinces his reluctant friend Noel (nicknamed “Turtle” for his hunched back) to row out with him and scavenge fish to sell. They haul in more than their boat can carry, but the scheme turns perilous when Hélcio dives too deep in pursuit of a still-lively mullet that would make a favorite stew. As he scrabbles back toward air, his life flashes before him—childhood memories, work in a textile factory, recruitment to the Canto do Rio football club, and coaches bawling him out for straying from the back line. He surfaces in time to breathe, but the bay has further tests in store. At the low point of their ill-fated quest, Hélcio calls Noel a slur, shattering the friends’ brittle bond. The story’s second act pursues a reconciliation complicated by the growing disparity of their futures: Hélcio at the soccer club, Noel collecting bottles on the beach. Quintanilha’s cartooning favors crisp, stylized realism, with a swashbuckling vigor that recalls classic Tarzan and Corto Maltese. This is adventure storytelling with disarming emotional heft—a taut study of wounded pride, precarious camaraderie, and words that can’t be taken back. (Mar.)