Serraria, 80 & 52 min, est. release 2028

Two hundred kilometres from the bustling metropolis of São Paulo is the island of Ilhabela, where the tiny caiçara community of Serraria is resisting the construction of a foreign-owned luxury resort. A mix of African, Indigenous, and Portuguese settler roots, caiçaras have inhabited Brazil’s coastline for centuries, relying on artisanal fishing for their livelihood. With Serraria the last community of its kind on Ilhabela, Japanese-caiçara filmmaker Ricardo Imakawa revisits his family’s history of forced displacement and reflects on the ongoing threat that predatory tourism and land speculation poses to Brazil’s traditional coastal communities and their ancestral relationship with the land and sea.

Directors: Ricardo Imakawa, Matias Borgström
Producers (Brazil): Matias Borgström, Ricardo Imakawa (Salga Filmes), Paula Pripas (Filmes de Abril)
Co-Producer (Japan): Emi Ueyama (Article Films)
Co-producer (Canada): Marc Serpa Francoeur (Lost Time Media)

Produced with support from the São Paulo State Department of Culture

Presented at the IDFA Forum 2025, MIRADAS Afroindígenas 2025, #LINK:RIO 2025, and FICCI 2026