THE DEVIL QUEEN
[A RAINHA DIABA]
In the underworld of 1970s Rio de Janeiro, the feared “Devil Queen” rules a drug cartel from the back room of a brothel. Draped in green eyeshadow and menace, she commands loyalty with a jackknife that serves equally for shaving legs and slitting throats. Her grip on power begins to falter as rival factions — favela gangsters, drag queens and sex workers — turn on one another in a violent struggle to claim her throne, exposing a world where those excluded from bourgeois society fight for dominance on the margins. Directed by Antônio Carlos de Fontoura during Brazil’s military dictatorship, this lurid tale is loosely inspired by the legendary 1930s gangster João Francisco dos Santos. The film reimagines the figure in a 1970s setting as an early, provocative representation of queerness. As the Devil Queen, Milton Gonçalves delivers a striking performance that destabilizes rigid notions of masculinity, dissolving the binary of macho and queen into something volatile and unforgettable. (Note courtesy of Kino Lorber). DIR/SCR Antônio Carlos de Fontoura; PROD Roberto Farias. 1974, Brazil, color, 99 min. In Portuguese with English subtitles. NOT RATED
Restored by CinemaScópio and Cinelimite.
Run Time: 99 Minutes
Opening Date: Friday, June 26, 2026
Genre: Drama
