General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20265 min read

Nina (2004 film)

Nina is a 2004 Brazilian psychological drama directed by Heitor Dhalia, a free adaptation of Fyodor Dostoevsky's novel Crime and Punishment (1866) transposed to São Paulo. It stars Guta Stresser as Nina, a poor, fragile illustrator who rents a room from the miserly landlady Eulália (Myriam Muniz) and, ground down by her mistreatment, becomes involved in a crime.¹^•² The film was Dhalia's feature debut.³

Key fact	Detail
Director / debut	Heitor Dhalia's first feature film³
Source	Free adaptation of Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment; screenplay by Dhalia and Marçal Aquino²
Setting	The streets and slum areas of central São Paulo²^•³
Release	5 November 2004 in Brazil; distributed by Columbia⁴^•¹
Runtime	85 minutes⁴
Budget	R$2.4 million²
Reception	17% on the Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer (6 reviews); IMDb 6.6/10⁵

Spoilers

Plot and characters

Nina (Guta Stresser) is a young woman of acute sensitivity and a fragile mind who struggles to survive in an inhuman metropolis. She rents a room in the apartment of Dona Eulália (Myriam Muniz), an old, mean, exploitative landlady who seems to take pleasure in crushing her tenant's will.¹ Eulália intercepts the money Nina's mother sends, locks the refrigerator so Nina cannot eat, and even labels the food with her name.⁶^•⁷

After Nina loses her waitressing job, her situation worsens and she sinks into a violent fantasy world, drawing compulsively and fleeing into her comic strips.⁵^•⁸ The Korean festival catalog describes the escalation: starving, she eats cat food, throws out the landlady's cat, and steals money from a blind man who has shown her kindness, so that the injustice of her situation crosses into the territory of personal choice.⁹ The film ends with her involvement in a crime.¹

The supporting cast includes Wagner Moura as the blind man (Cego), Selton Mello, Lázaro Ramos and Matheus Nachtergaele as painters, Renata Sorrah as a prostitute, Milhem Cortaz as Carlão, and Juliana Galdino, Sabrina Greve, Luíza Mariani, Guilherme Weber, and Abrahão Farc in supporting roles.¹^•¹⁰

Style and the Dostoevsky connection

The filmmakers themselves described Nina as a reinterpretation of Crime and Punishment rather than an adaptation. Dhalia said he had been impressed by the novel when he first read it, ten years before conceiving the film, and that he had always been fascinated by Dostoevsky's character psychology.² The film opens with Nina's voice distinguishing ordinary people from extraordinary ones, an idea taken from the novel, in which Raskolnikov commits murder believing himself an extraordinary man.¹¹

Visual approach. The film mixes live action with grotesque animations of Nina's drawings, by the cartoonist Lourenço Mutarelli, with effects and animation by LOBO and Vetor Zero; the atmosphere of the animations is re-created in live action in the later part of the film.¹²^•⁹ Critics noted an expressionist visual influence and comparisons with David Lynch, and the Rotterdam festival catalog described the result as a blend of Franz Kafka with David Lynch.¹³^•⁹^•⁸ The film deliberately blurs the line between fact and hallucination, leaving open whether the crime occurred as shown.¹⁴

Production

The screenplay went through twelve versions by Marçal Aquino, a writer known for his work with director Beto Brant on O Invasor and other films.¹⁵ Shooting began in January 2003 with a budget of R$2.4 million, and Dhalia initially hoped to premiere at the 2004 Sundance Film Festival.¹⁵ The film was produced by Gullane, the company of brothers Caio and Fabiano Gullane, with associated producers including Quanta, Fábrica Brasileira de Imagens, and Branca Filmes, and support from Globo Filmes.¹^•¹² José Roberto Eliezer was the cinematographer, Estevan Santos the editor, and Antônio Pinto the composer.¹² It was filmed on location in São Paulo.¹⁶

Release and reception

Nina premiered commercially in Brazil on 5 November 2004, distributed by Columbia.⁴^•¹ Before that it screened at the Festival do Rio 2004 and the 28th Mostra Internacional de Cinema de São Paulo, and it appeared at the Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival in the Puchon Choice features section.¹⁷^•⁹ At the Moscow Festival it received the critics' prize.²

Commercial performance. The film underperformed at the Brazilian box office: Dhalia later described it as a public failure that drew fewer than 40,000 spectators.¹⁸ The ANCINE record of commercially released Brazilian films lists 25,268 admissions and R$178,184 in box office revenue for Nina in 2004.¹⁹

Critical response. Reception was divided. On Rotten Tomatoes the film holds a 17% Tomatometer from six reviews against a 53% audience score.⁵ Variety's Deborah Young called it a Brazilian offering packed with good ideas in a sophisticated horror vein but disappointing in its unraveling, and The Hollywood Reporter's Frank Scheck wrote that technical prowess could not compensate for slow pacing and a confusingly fractured narrative.⁵ The Brazilian critic Pablo Villaça gave it 5/5, praising the expressionist visual influence, the bold performances, and Dhalia's assured direction.⁵ Folha de S.Paulo's review credited the rigor of the cinematography and editing while arguing that the Dostoevskian premise functioned as little more than a slogan.¹¹ Dhalia later said the film had been a rejected ugly duckling even after completion, and that its reception led him toward the lighter, more popular approach of his next feature, O Cheiro do Ralo (2006).¹⁸

Legacy

The film earned Dhalia a special mention from the critics at the Moscow Festival and the cinematography award at the Lima Latin American Film Festival.²⁰ As of recent catalog listings, Nina is not available on streaming services in Brazil, the United States, or Belgium.¹⁰

References

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 21, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026