About us

HL Filmes is a producer of audiovisual content, series and movies, for cinema and TV, based in Tocantins, with five feature films and four documentary series released, and a brand focused on culture, diversity, human rights and environmental questions.

The production company focuses on the production of works that portray the development of cultural, geographic and economic diversity in Brazil, as well as its favoring and inclusion of Brazilian culture, especially in the North region, in the context of global issues.

The production company has films such as “Age of Water” (2018), by award-winning filmmaker Orlando Senna, on the issue of water in the Amazon, “In the Force of Law” (2022), a series by Hermes Leal about human rights, which discusses the laws that changed the country, “Amazon Fashion”, directed by Nival Correia from Tocantins, about fashion and sustainability in the Amazon, and “Before the Dream Ends”, by Lírio Ferreira, fiction about the genocide of the military dictatorship in the Araguaia War.

HL Filmes is headed by Hermes Leal, an experienced journalist, writer, documentary filmmaker and TV director, who has worked on cable and open TV (Rede Record, SBT and more than 10 years as program director at Rede Manchete), creator and editor of Revista de CINEMA since 2000. He is a writer with eight books published, including two novels and two biographies, graduated in Journalism from UFG, Master in Cinema from ECA/USP and PhD in Linguistics and Semiotics of Passions from FFLCH/USP.

Leal is the director of two important documentaries, “Araguaia”, about death and torture in the Araguaia War, and “Law and Fear”, about the fear of losing democratic achievements due to the election of Bolsonaro, in 2018. He also directed the philosophical series “Contemporary Thought”, based on Café Filosófico on TV Cultura.

Producing what is relevant to Brazil

PRODUCTIONS IN PROGRESS

What's next...

Before the Dream Ends

Youth drama, action and adventure, which tells the story of Daniel, a sensitive boy raised in the Amazon, along with anaconda cubs, a raw soul and pure feelings, who desperately tries to escape a life that is almost a slave.

Being So Woman - Erotic Tales of the Sertão

Fiction series, in 6 episodes, adapted from the short stories by Conceição Senna, about six women, sertanejas in the middle of the 20th century, unified by the Northeastern culture.

Waves

The story of a surfer who hires a professional killer to eliminate his brother and rival; of a killer who hires a punisher to do his job; of a beautiful and helpless young woman who seduces the punisher to eliminate the killer the surfer hired.

Diretores

Hermes Leal

PhD in Fiction Narrative, Hermes Leal is a writer, with seven books published, explorer and documentarist. He is a journalist, graduated from UFG, Master in Cinema, with a specialization in Screenplay by ECA / USP, and a Doctor of Letters, with a specialization in Linguistics and Semiotics of Passions, by FFLCH / USP.

The author specialized in narrative theory after three decades of research in fiction, and had his studies published by Perspectiva, in 2017, in the famous Coleção Estudos, with the title “The Passions in the Narrative – The Construction of the Cinema Script” , in the same collection in which the world’s greatest thinkers, such as Gilles Deleuze and Michel Foucault, were released in Brazil. The importance of the research was due to its application in the creation of characters based on their passions and emotions, in a new science of knowledge, the Semiotics of Passions, recently discovered in France.

In the work, released in 2023, “The Sense of Passions – Semiotic Theory of Narrative and Fiction”, the author offers writers a theoretical structure of the action and emotion of the characters, demonstrating its perfect application in the scripts and characters in films such as “Roma”, “ Joker” and “Parasite” and in series like “Game of Thrones”.

A good storyteller, he is the author of the novel “Before the Dream Ends” (Editorial Generation, 2016), about a young man fleeing the Amazon in the dark times of the Cold War, which will be filmed under the direction of award-winning filmmaker Lírio Ferreira and distributed from O2 Play. His first novel, “I’m Fuck!”, released in 1997 and re-released in 2006, with the title “Knife in the Throat”, generated controversy by showing a generation of teenagers in the 1990s, who could do anything but beat AIDS.

Hermes is an explorer, his adventures are always authentic in places little or never explored. He is the author of “Quilombo – An Adventure in the Bay of Souls” (1995) and of the first biography of the adventurer who inspired Indiana Jones, “The Enigma of Colonel Fawcett” (Geração Editorial, 4th edition, 2008), about the English hunter of lost cities in Brazil. The book became a small bestseller, with five printed editions, and tells the adventure of Fawcett and the author himself in search of clues about his mysterious disappearance.

He worked for several open TV channels, is a producer, screenwriter and director of important TV series, such as “Contemporary Thought” (Curta! channel and Vivo Play, Claro TV, Amazon Prime Video and Looke), based on Café Filosófico, on TV Cultura. His series “Filmmakers”, which premiered in 2017 on the Prime Box Brazil channel, aired in 2020/2021 on the Curta! and A&E and available on Vivo Play and Looke, it received, in 2020, the ProAC award from the government of SP, through the Aldir Blanc Act, to develop its 2nd season. As well as the documentary feature “The Image of Brazil”, which was also awarded the same award.

He is a producer of award-winning films, such as “Age of Water”, by Orlando Senna – famous director of “Iracema – An Amazonian Transa” (1980) -, which participated in more than 20 festivals in Brazil and abroad, elected the best film of the Cine del Agua, in Argentina, on the issue of the water crisis in the Amazon. The film was shown on Amazon Prime Video and is available on Vivo Play, Claro TV and Pluto. He is the creator and screenwriter of the series “Amazon Fashion”, shown on the Fashion TV channel and available on Amazon Prime Video and on the Arte 1 channel, which deals with fashion based on sustainable products in the Amazon.

He launched the documentaries “Araguaia” (Vivo Play, Claro TV, Looke), about the guerrilla that mobilized the largest troops in Brazil since the Second World War, and “Law and Fear” (Vivo Play, Claro TV, Looke and Sky Play), about the fear of losing democratic achievements in the face of Bolsonaro’s election in 2018.

He is currently co-producing the feature “Red”, a new film by Orlando Senna, a production by Montanha Cinematográfica, by Alice de Andrade, in an international co-production with Circular Media, from Uruguay, and has just finalized the creation and script of his first series of fiction, “Waves”.

A television professional, with a career that started in the 1990s, he worked as a TV director at Rede Manchete, where he was for ten years and created the first police reality show in Brazil, “Na Rota do Crime” (On the Path of Crime), audience champion for years. He also acted in journalism for SBT, Rede TV and Record.

Livros de Hermes Leal

The Sense of Passions

Zagodoni, 2023

The work reveals how to develop characters and narratives and the invisible layers of award-winning films, such as “A Doce Vida”, “Jules e Jim”, “Roma”, “Joker”, “Bacurau”, “O Som ao Redor”, “Parasite” , and series, such as “Game of Thrones”, “Round 6” and “Big Little Lies”, in addition to literature by Proust and Camus.

The Passions in the Characters

Screenwriter Online, 2020

Formulas, schemes and theoretical models that allow the authors to master the structures of the “action” and “emotion” of the characters, in a theory supported by linguistics, logic and philosophy.

The Passions in the Narrative

Perspectiva, 2017

Doctoral thesis with unprecedented theory for the script and character development.

Before the Dream Ends

Geração Editorial, 2014

Novel based on real facts, in the late 1960s, in the middle of the Amazonian hinterland, in a small town “disconnected from the world”, on the banks of the Tocantins River, about the sad episode of the hunt for communists, but the story of a dreamy teenager.

The Mountain Man

Imesp – Coleção Aplauso, 2008

Biography of filmmaker Orlando Senna, former Audiovisual Secretary of the Ministry of Culture, author of films such as “Iracema, an Amazon Transa” and one of the founders of the Cuban film school.

The Enigma of Colonel Fawcett, the True Story of Indiana Jones

Ediouro e Geração Editorial, 1996 – 4th edition, 2008

First biography of the English colonel who disappeared into the Brazilian forests while looking for a lost city.

Knife in the Throat

Geração Editorial, 1998 – 2th edition, 2007

A kind of Romeo and Juliet for the 21st century. A book that undoubtedly divides opinions – although it has even been adopted and openly discussed in modern schools.

Quilombo, an Adventure in the Bay of Souls

Mercuryo, 1995

The report of an adventure in an isolated hinterland, in the heart of Brazil.

Outros diretores

Orlando Senna

Filmmaker and writer, Orlando Senna directed fiction ("Iracema, an Amazon Transa", "Rough Diamond", "Gitirana") and documentaries, wrote screenplays ("Malandro's Opera", "Colonel Delmiro Gouveia") and novels ("A Taste of Eternity", "The Sheets and the Dreams"). He was general director of the International School of Cinema and TV in Cuba and TV Brasil, president of TAL-Televisão América Latina and National Secretary for Audiovisual. He sits on the board of directors of the Fundación del Nuevo Cine Latinoamericano.

Lourival Sant'Anna

The international analyst for CNN Brasil is a director of documentaries at 2F Fact-Finding Films, a reporter for the app "Exame Hoje", a columnist and blog author for "Estadão" and a commentator on international affairs for Radio CBN. He was a special reporter for the newspaper "O Estado de São Paulo", between 1998 and 2000 and between 2001 and 2015. During this period, he covered 60 countries, including all of South America, with the exception of Guyana and French Guiana, in the North and Central America, Europe, Africa, Middle East and Asia.

Nival Correia

Director from Tocantins of the children's fiction series “The Clay Doll and the King”, for TV Brasil, the series “Sport is Health”, the feature films “Anna's Diary” and “Anonymous” and the short film "Pretty Girl with Braids".