Discoveries from Portugal World Cinema

A class of 9-year-old children is making an animated movie, whose chosen theme is the “War on Iraq”. Their protagonists are the same we see on TV: George W. Bush, Tony Blair, Saddam, and Bin Laden. But the story is quite more imaginative… Children talk with no interference from adults, and the final result is the product of their free expression. While they discuss war matters and fiction strategy, camera captures their dialogs with intimacy, and shows us their unexpected sense of humour. Nevertheless, they commit to the story with total dedication and faithfulness, as in a real labour. The way they make decisions, and talk and listen to each other, is a vivid lesson of democracy (in every place of the world).

A king. A reign. A life. A journey through the head of poet and provocateur Rui Reininho. From innocence to the discovery of sin, from anarchism to salvation through art and spirituality, this is a film that reveals the creative processes and worldview of one of the greatest living cultural references in Portugal. At the age of 67, Reininho takes on the throne, drops the cloak and and exposes his naked soul.

A football player and part-time fisherman starts to clean the beach he lives next to.

Rodrigo questions his belonging to Eclectic City, the small religious commune he grew up in.

From his home in Lisbon, Lebanese-Palestinian writer Saleem Haddad reflects on memory, his family and the strangeness of the sea. He chases his grandmother’s fast-fading recollections of Palestine, where she lived many decades ago, and thinks about writing the homeland from a distance.

There is a village in the mountain and a house in the village, where Ema repeats gestures and tasks: she takes care of her grandmother, walks, reads, waits. Until one day the cycle breaks: what happened in the mountain house?

Alquimistas do Som is a documentary about experimentation in MPB. Some of the most important Brazilian musicians comment, in exclusive testimonials, on their incursions into experimentalism: the origins, motivations and consequences for their work and for the evolutionary line of MPB. Current testimonials are illustrated with musicals by Fernando Faro, in addition to other images from the TV Cultura archive. Alquimistas dos Sons promotes an exciting reunion of artists with historical television images.

Documentary about the work of the painter Nikias Skapinakis from the exhibition “Imaginary Bedrooms” which in June 2006 opened at the Museum Arpad Scenes-Vieira da Silva. Film by Jorge Silva Melo that closely follows the work of one of the most important painters of the second half of the 20th century, specifically in the area of portrait.

Short film by Fernando Lopes, decisive figure of the Portuguese New Wave.

A large group of people gather around a table for a meal. Food is served under a noisy, almost circus atmosphere. Gifts are made and congratulations are sung. At some point there are already those who sleep, who read, who date. The environment is increasingly fragmented. In the end there is only dirty dishes and silence.

After accepting a job propose in a coastline city and getting divorce, Edu takes his 17 years old daughter to spend vacations together, even she hates the idea, some events will change their lives forever.

Poem of images and sounds around man and nature.

Tia Creuza is a lady who works in a family home, and tells in a very funny way how is the day to day in the house of the bosses, personal life and everyday things. Mockumentary made by MTV, starring Marcelo Adnet.

This documentary shows a typical Sunday in Mozambique's capital, tourist main attractions, an inquest in Lisbon about the perception of the people in the street about what life was like in that African colony (or, as the Government had it then, "province"), and then interviews and scenes of Lourenço Marques fishermen and a bar waitresses. African folk music and dance were used as documents and background for the text narration.

After Lucinda do Carmo is abducted from a theatre, the police are on the case. This film is lost.

Daniel e Daniela is the story of a father who takes his daughter on a journey to her origins. They travel through Cape Verde, São Tomé and Guinea-Bissau, both guided by the desire to see, know and talk. Between laughter, songs and books, everything they will find along the way is a pretext for another story that interweaves past and present, between Nubians, Carthaginians and Egyptians, slavery and colonialism, racism and prejudice; everything is matter for another philosophy lesson, a reflection on the History of Africa or the challenges of development. Daniel, 83, wants to leave his daughter Daniela, 12, with knowledge and critical thinking, preparing her for the future with a heart full of hope and freedom. After all, in Daniel's own words: "the greatest investment is the human one".

In a small apartment in the city, a mother and her son live their own secret and silent routines, sharing these not even with each other. They would like to spend time together, perhaps even talk to each other, but he grows up with animals and planets, whereas she is always elsewhere. The long and circular days push them further inside themselves, but maybe the spark of an unexpected connection can still set them free.

A surreal journey of a displaced spirit as he wanders through the temporal landscape of a quaint ancestral village lost in the mountains.

In 1969, Fernando Gabeira was among terrorists who kidnapped Charles Burke Elbrick, then the U.S. Ambassador to Brazil. Eventually Gabeira was captured and tortured before being exiled from his homeland for eight years. He talks candidly about his experiences in captivity as well as the abduction and the motivation behind choosing Elbrick.

Somewhere between fiction and reality, a touching story questions the cause of things.

The reality that surrounds us is an intense and increasingly dense sensorial repetition. In this film, synchronization and desynchronization alternate in a mesmerizing way, in a textural atmosphere.

A screenwriter tries to write an idea for a film, but the writing cursor escapes the computer screen.

“Dear Marisa, now an entire planet separates us. 17900 kilometres to be precise. At this threshold of paradise, there is only one thing I can do. Wait. And at last, the Ultimate Bliss will find us, baby.” A film-diary and an exercise of memory

An immersive film experience based on the play "Última Memória" by Sara Carinhas.

A collective film by and with residents of Monte de Caparica, whose “development resulted from a process overseen by a permanent team of three tutors (Ana Eliseu, Luís M. Correia, and Susana Nobre), with sessions led by guest directors (Basil da Cunha, Falcão Nhaga) as well as other professionals connected to film work (Paulo Menezes, Leonardo Simões, Nuno Carvalho, Nádia Henriques, André Silva Santos).

Exploring dreams within their local community the students set out to awaken and root environmental responsibility diving into aquatic practices through an ocean literacy program.

Janaina is tired, and that can be scary.

One day, then another, a worker in an automated factory does his job and forgets his past. The factory fails. Accuses. He runs away. One day, but then another, the man sees through his memory to a disconcerting reality.

An exploration of the daily life, streets, and interiors of Santa Iria de Azóia, the Lisbon suburb where the director was born and raised.

In a village in Melgaço, Adelino Fernandes, better known as Aires, spends his days working in his "tiny" workshop at home. Retired and at 87 years old, he dedicates himself to arranging the most diverse objects at the request of neighbors for whom he is very fond, and he asks them for nothing in return. A poetic portrait of a man who contributes to his community and in return life smiles back at him.

Portuguese short film by João Ferreira

The documentary shows the academic movement and its several crisis by the players perspective and the way they contributed and involved themselves in the movement as students and Men. The main focus will be on the players and the academic leaders in this process during the 60’s.