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Brazil’s Spcine, the city of São Paulo’s film-tv body, is delivering tangible results with its cash rebate program as it prepares for its third edition later this year. Four projects have advanced under the second rebate, including dark medical thriller “Suture,” created by Fabio Montanari and produced by Boutique Filmes for Amazon Prime Video, which secured R$3 million.

The series follows Ícaro (Humberto Morais), a debt-ridden doctor and Dr. Mancini (Cláudia Abreu), a top surgeon battling trauma-induced tremors, as they lead a double life performing illegal procedures.

Other partially funded projects include a Portuguese-language remake of Justin Timberlake and Mila Kunis starrer “Friends with Benefits”, the telenovela “Scars of Beauty”, and “Maníaco do Parque”, a dramatization of Brazil’s most infamous serial killer.

Launched in 2021, the initiative stood alone in Brazil as the country’s first and at the time, only, production incentive.

Ary Scapin, Director of economic...

The raving success of Globoplay’s medical drama “Under Pressure” — which ran for five heavily acclaimed seasons between 2017 and 2022 — was bound to see Brazil firmly step into procedurals, and Amazon Prime Video’s “Suture” is proof of just that. The eight-episode series, selected as part of the Berlinale Series Market Selects, follows gifted medical student Ícaro (Humberto Morais) and surgeon Mancini (Claudia Abreu) as the duo is forced to work for a criminal organization as their underground medical support team.

Co-produced by Brazil’s Boutique Filmes and Miami-based production and distribution banner Spiral International, “Suture” aired on Amazon Prime Video at the tail end of 2024. The medical procedure is the latest co-production between Boutique Filmes and Spiral International, who also worked together on “Falco” and “Negociador.”

Speaking with Variety ahead of Berlin, Spiral International CEO Zasha Robles — who signs as a showrunner and executive producer of “Suture” — says he and...