Brazilian filmmakers Victor Di Marco and Márcio Picoli’s debut feature, “London”, will premiere in Venice Critics’ Week. The queer BDSM drama challenges portrayals of disability as something to be fixed, placing a disabled young adult at the centre of a melodrama and presenting his body as a source of agency, knowledge and desire.

Di Marco plays London, a dominant at a fetish house who is offered an imaging test that could diagnose his disability, forcing him to weigh his need for answers against fear of being reduced to a medical label. The directors say the film responds to a wider culture of pathologising and “perfecting” bodies; while comparisons with David Cronenberg are welcomed, they describe their approach as an opposite perspective focused on disabled bodies in the present and the universal importance of accessibility.