Guerras Invisíveis is a project that brings together music, cinema, and science to expose an overlooked humanitarian crisis: the psychological trauma experienced by children growing up surrounded by violence in Brazil’s favelas. Independent studies have found levels of post-traumatic stress symptoms among children in Rio de Janeiro comparable to those found in soldiers exposed to wars around the world, including the conflicts in Ukraine and Palestine. To bring this invisible reality to the forefront, we created a 17-minute short film starring L7NNON, an artist with over 4.3 billion streams on Spotify.

The film’s purpose is to make people see, feel, and recognize the psychological impact of growing up in a war zone even when that war has no official declaration, no borders, and no headlines. Using the visual language of a large-scale war film, we transform the psychological battles faced by these children into a dystopian battlefield, turning invisible trauma into a powerful cinematic experience. Beyond raising awareness, the project also supports academic research to further investigate the parallels between childhood exposure to urban violence and the psychological effects of living through war.