The film is a hypnotic reflection on contemporary indigenous experience and urbanization in the Brazilian Amazon. The premiere took place on March 19 at Film at Lincoln Center, NYC.
Winner of the Best Direction award at the Chicago International Film Festival, Best Actor at the International Critics, and the Special Jury Awards at the Locarno International Film Festival, as well as being part of the official selection at New Directors/New Films, Mar del Plata, TIFF, Rotterdam, Pingyao, and Thessaloniki, among others, The Fever is a mesmerizing portrait of the profound and subtle confrontation between indigenous ways of life and the pressures of western urbanization in Manaus, an industrial city surrounded by the Amazon rainforest.
The story of the film revolves around Justino, a 45-year-old member of the Desana indigenous people who works as a security guard at the port of Manaus. Since the death of his wife, his main companion is his youngest daughter with 
whom he lives on the outskirts of the city. A nurse at the local clinic, Vanessa is accepted to study medicine in Brasília and plans to leave soon. As days go by, Justino is overcome by a strong fever. During the day, he struggles to stay awake at work. At night, a mysterious creature follows his steps. Meanwhile, the visit from his brother makes him remember the life he left deep in the forest twenty years ago. Between the oppression of the city and the distance from his native village, Justino can no longer bear his existence without a sense of belonging.
An empathetic inquiry into the relationship between indigenous cultures and western civilization, The Fever by Maya Da-Rin is a powerful indictment of the nature of progress at a time when more and more indigenous communities face territorial and pathogenic devastations brought about by mass deforestation and the health crisis caused by COVID-19.
Maya Da-Rin is a filmmaker and visual artist. She graduated from Le Fresnoy – Studio National des Arts Contemporains in France, 
holds a master’s degree in Cinema and Art History from Sorbonne Nouvelle, and has participated in workshops at the Cuban School of Cinema. Her work has been exhibited at film festivals and art institutions worldwide, including Toronto, DokLeipzig, MoMA, and the Vilnius Contemporary Art Centre. Her documentary Terras (2010) was shown at over forty festivals, and her first feature, The Fever, was selected for the Cinéfondation residency at the Cannes Film Festival and for the La Fabrique des Cinémas du Monde and Torino Film-Lab workshops, among others. Premiering at the Locarno Film Festival, The Fever received the Best Actor award in Locarno, the FIPRESCI Prize for Best Film, and also the award for “Environment is quality of life.”