PORTUGUESE FILMS AT BERLINALE

Before Berlinale starts, we want to tell you about the films that will be present at this international film festival.

A COMPETITION WITH TWO FILMS

Teresa Villaverde’s new film was selected for the the official Competition section of the 67th edition of the Berlin International Film Festival, the most important and prestigious section of the festival for feature films. In COLO you can see a very current and almost serene reflection on our common path as European societies. It talks about our isolation and our perplexity when facing difficulties that arise. A growing tension that never actually explodes. With the actors João Pedro Vaz, Alice Albergaria Borges, Beatriz Batarda and Clara Jost. Now, going back in time to the eighteenth century, we present JOAQUIM, by Marcelo Gomes, a Portuguese-Brazilian production. This feature film, produced by Ukbar Filmes, recreates the historical figure of Joaquim Xavier, Tiradentes, considered by many as a national hero, in the first attempt to make Brazil independent.

4 PORTUGUESE DIRECTORS IN BERLINALE SHORTS

In the short film competition of the 67th edition of Berlinale, Salomé Lamas, João Salaviza, Gabriel Abrantes and Diogo Costa Amarante will be the Portuguese directors present with the 4 short films selected for the competitive section Berlinale Shorts. In Gabriel Álvares' HUMORES ARTIFICIAIS, we are presented with an extravagant odyssey about the romance between Jo, a young aboriginal girl fleeing from her village to São Paulo, and Coughman, an intelligent robot capable of making jokes, under the theme of indigenous rights and political activism. Salomé Lamas is featured in this year's edition with COUP DE GRÂCE, whose main character, Leonor, returns from a trip on a day when her father Francisco no longer expected her. In a period of 24 hours, they will live a hallucinated reality driven by the restlessness of the father in apparent normality. In the CIDADE PEQUENA , by Diogo Costa Amarante, we witness a day when Frederico learns at school that people have a head, body and limbs, and that if the heart stops, people die. That night, he did not sleep and woke his mother up several times to tell her that his chest hurt. Finally, in ALTAS CIDADES DE OSSADAS by João Salaviza, we meet Karlon, born in Pedreira dos Húngaros and pioneer of Creole rap, who fled the neighbourhood where he had been relocated to. Altas Cidades de Ossadas has an inquisitive and imaginative touch to its memories, to the institutional siege, and to the submerged stories of a dark time.

OTHER SECTIONS WITH PORTUGUESE PRODUCTIONS

In this year's edition, Portuguese spoken cinema will be featured with Kristin Ulseth's ODD É UM OVO, in the Short Films Generation Kplus; Filipa César's SPELL REEL, that is part of the list of 43 films selected for Forum 2017: Realistic and Surreal; and in the Panorama section we will have Daniela Thomas’ VAZANTE.

ODD É UM OVO is produced by Luís da Matta Almeida who started this project in 2012, agreeing with the Norwegian author and illustrator Lisa Aisato, the adaptation of her book "Odd er et egg", later inviting Kristin Ulseth to co-produce it.

VAZANTE explores loneliness and the relationships between races and genders on the banks of Colonial Brazil. Whites, native blacks, and newcomers from Africa suffer the ills of incommunicability on an imposing farm, in the decaying region of diamonds, Minas Gerais. This story takes place in the early nineteenth century.

SPELL REEL is an archive of audiovisual material re-emerging in Bissau. On the verge of complete ruin, the images bear witness to the birth of Guinean cinema as part of the decolonizing vision of Amílcar Cabral, the liberation leader assassinated in 1973. From the more isolated villages of Guinea Bissau to European capitals, the silent images are now the place where everyone looks for antidotes for a world in crisis.

MORE PORTUGUESE FILMS AT BERLINALE

The actress Victoria Guerra will be the Portuguese Shooting Star, selected by an International Jury made up of producers, directors, and casting producers and directors. Producer and director Mário Patrocínio and director Luís Campos will be present at Berlinale Talents, as well as the project A SHORT FILM FOR THE DEAD, by Singaporean Daniel Hui, co-produced by Tan Bee Thiam, Joana Gusmão and Pedro Fernandes Duarte.

Also to be noted, on February 11, the public presentation of the new system of tax incentives for the shooting of films on Portuguese land, in The Mirror.

As usual, ICA will be present in Berlin with a stand at the European Film Market, a parallel event to the Festival that attracts film professionals from all over the world.